1986, Directed by Rob Reiner
cast: Will Wheaton( as Gordie), River Pheonix(as chris), Corery Feldman(as teddy), Jerry o’ Connell (as Vern), Popeye (as Chopper)
As part of my movie class i was required to see the movie Stand by Me. Furthermore, I am required to write a movie review for it, so here it is. Stand by Me is an old drama movie produced in 80’s and is your typical movie about a couple of under-prviveliged going out on a adventure and getting in trouble. It is based off of Stephen King’s novel the Body.
The story takes place after a man reading the newspaper reads about a man stabbed to death in a diner. He then starts reminiscing to when 12 and went out to see his first glimpse of death when he and 3 other friends go to try and find a dead body. Later on in the film however it turns more from an adventure, to a race to get the body, before a group of the neighbourhood thugs get to claim the body first.
There are a few obvious stars in the film such as Will Wheaton, River Pheonix, and Corey Feldman. However there are some under appreciated actors in the film such as Matt Williams and Casey Siemaszko. I especially liked Popeye’s role as the leader of the thug gang. He played the role of the passive aggressive leader of the gang quite well.
Going into the movie i expected to hate it, since I extremely dislike most dramas and have a particular distaste for the song Stand by Me which drones on throughout the movie as its personal theme song. However after viewing it for a bit the movie was moderately enjoyable. I was also pleasantly surprised with the music choices besides the various remixes of Stand by Me with their choices of songs from the 50s. However i’ve always been partial to songs from the 50’s and 40’s so it was already a given that i would like the songs. All in all not something i’d personally go out to movie theatre and afford the outrageous price for a movie ticket, but a nice distraction from class.
There was no actual moral in the movie. What moral there could have been was just replaced by sappy nostalgia and kid drama, however I think others might misinterpret it as some clichéd moral such as “life is fleeting. death can come at any time” or some other rubbish.
I think people more of my fathers age would enjoy the movie, since the storyline of kids takes place at the same time he was a kid (However there was a very huge difference between a kid growing up in a boring suburb and a kid growing up in war-torn britian, so i don’t know if he would be able to relate that much to the main charecter). I wouldn’t really recommend the movie to anyone except people who have a thing sappy kid dramas. Back in the days when it was produced the movie may have ganerned a PG rating, but nowadays with today’s lilly-livered rating system it would probably rate at a pg-13 at least what with the dead bodies, underage smoking, and swearing.
Begrudgingly, i give the movie 4 stars out of five, however one those stars might just be from my like of the oldies songs which occasiocally pops up in the movie.
-Gareth is a senior highschool student who’s hobbies include the entertainment buisness and sarcasm. On his off time when he is not criticising things he likes he is usually playing video games or working on personal art projects.
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