Psycho's Movie Reviews #62: The Goonies (1985)

The Goonies is a 1985 American adventure comedy film co-produced and directed by Richard Donner from a screenplay by Chris Columbus, based on a story by executive producer Steven Spielberg. In the film, kids who live in the "Goon Docks" neighbourhood of Astoria, Oregon, attempt to save their homes from foreclosure and, in doing so, they discover an old treasure map that takes them on an adventure to unearth the long-lost fortune of One-Eyed Willy, a legendary 17th-century pirate. During the adventure, they are chased by a family of criminals who want the treasure for themselves.

Produced by Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment, Warner Bros. released the film theatrically on June 7, 1985, in the United States. The film grossed $124 million worldwide on a budget of $19 million and has since become a cult film. In 2017, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Plot:

Facing foreclosure of their homes in the Goon Docks area of Astoria, Oregon, to an expanding country club, a group of children who call themselves "the Goonies", gather for a final weekend together. The Goonies include optimist lead Goonie Mikey Walsh, his older brother Brandon, the inventive Data, the talkative Mouth, and the klutz Chunk.

Rummaging through the Walshes' attic, they come across a 1632 doubloon and an old treasure map purporting to lead to the treasure of legendary pirate "One-Eyed Willy", believed to be located somewhere nearby. Mikey considers One-Eyed Willy to be the original Goonie. The kids overpower and bind Brandon and make their way to an abandoned restaurant on the coast that coincides with the map; Brandon soon follows alongside Andy, a cheerleader with a crush on him; and Stef, Andy's friend. The group eventually discovers the derelict restaurant is a hideout of the Fratelli crime family: Francis, Jake, and their mother. The Goonies find a tunnel in the basement and follow it, but when Chunk flags down a motorist to go to the sheriff’s station, he gets abducted by the assailants and imprisoned with their hulking, deformed, younger brother Sloth. The Fratellis interrogate Chunk until he reveals where the Goonies have gone, and begin pursuit. Chunk is left behind with Sloth, but befriends him. After Sloth frees both of them, Chunk calls the sheriff, and both follow the trail of the Fratellis.

The Goonies evade several deadly booby traps along the tunnels, while staying ahead of the Fratellis. Finally, they reach the grotto where Willy's pirate ship, the Inferno, is anchored. The group discovers the ship is filled with treasure, and they start filling their pockets, but Mikey warns them not to take any on a set of scales in front of Willy, considering that to be their tribute to him. As they leave the ship, the assailants appear and strip them of their loot. They start to bind the Goonies and make them walk the plank, until Chunk arrives with Sloth and distracts the assailants long enough for the Goonies to jump overboard and swim to safety. The Fratellis proceed to grab all the treasure they can, including those on Willy's scales; this triggers another booby trap that causes the grotto to cave in. With Sloth's help, the Goonies and Fratellis barely escape.

The two groups emerge on Astoria's beach, where they reunite with the Goonies' families and the police. The Fratellis are arrested, but Chunk prevents Sloth from also being taken; he invites Sloth to live with him, which Sloth accepts. Just as Mikey’s father is about to sign the foreclosure papers, the Walshes' housekeeper, Rosalita, discovers that Mikey's marble bag is filled with gems he took from the ship and had not been seized by the Fratellis. Mikey's father triumphantly rips up the papers, declaring they have enough money to negate the foreclosure. As they are regaling the tale of their adventure to the disbelieving press and police, they notice the Inferno, having broken free of the grotto, sailing off on its own in the distance.

Production:

Principal photography on The Goonies began on October 22, 1984, and lasted five months. An additional six weeks of audio dubbing and recording were used. The shooting script was lengthy, at more than 120 pages, to which several sequences were eventually cut from the final theatrical version. During the film's dénouement, mention is made of an octopus, which refers to a scene that was excised from the final cut.

In the documentary The Making of The Goonies, Richard Donner noted both the difficulties and pleasures of working with so many child actors. He praised them for their energy and excitement, but also said that they were also unruly when brought together. As a result, the documentary frequently showed him coaching the actors and revealing some techniques he used to create realistic performances. One of these tricks involved One-Eyed Willy's pirate ship, which was actually a full-sized replica of a pirate ship created under the direction of production designer J. Michael Riva. Donner restricted the actors from seeing the ship until they filmed the scene wherein it is revealed to their characters; the characters' first glimpse of the ship was also the actors' first view of it, bringing about a more realistic performance. However, that particular scene in the final cut was actually the second take, due to the cast feeling so overwhelmed at first sight that the scene had to be reshot. The entire set was scrapped after shooting because they could not find anyone who wanted it.

In his book There and Back Again, Sean Astin claimed that Donner and Spielberg were "like co-directors" on the film as he compared and contrasted their styles when directing scenes.

Some of the on-location filming was done in Astoria. The interior and exterior of the old Clatsop County Jail features as the holding place of Jake Fratelli at the start of the film. (The building was later converted into the Oregon Film Museum, which opened on the 25th anniversary of The Goonies with memorabilia from this and other local films.) The museum where Mikey's father works is, in reality, the Captain George Flavel House Museum. The Walsh family home is a real home on the eastern end of the town. The road leading to the home was closed to tours in 2015. The scenes along the coast were filmed in Oregon, but they were a considerable distance from Astoria. The Goonies bicycle to Ecola State Park (in reality, over 26 miles south of Astoria) and then find the starting location of the map using Haystack Rock as a guide. Underground scenes were filmed at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, California, including the cavernous set where the Goonies find One-Eyed Willy's ship, which was in Stage 16, one of the largest sound stages in the United States. The final scene was shot at Goat Rock State Beach in Sonoma County, California.

The film also marked Wes Takahashi's first major motion picture as an animation supervisor for Industrial Light & Magic.

Soundtrack:

The Goonies: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack features music by Cyndi Lauper, REO Speedwagon, The Bangles, and others. The cast members (except Kerri Green) appeared alongside professional wrestlers "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, The Iron Sheik, Nikolai Volkoff, and "Captain" Lou Albano (who previously appeared in her "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" video) in the 12-minute "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough" music video. Steven Spielberg makes a cameo appearance. Lauper also has a cameo in the film, performing the song on TV, although the song was not completed until after filming.

Dave Grusin's score was unavailable for 25 years. The main theme, "Fratelli Chase", has been used in numerous trailers, such as Innerspace, Scrooged, and Guarding Tess, and was re-recorded by Grusin and the London Symphony Orchestra for the album Cinemagic. The score makes liberal use of the Max Steiner-composed theme from Adventures of Don Juan.

Soundtrack label Varèse Sarabande released the score on CD in March 2010 in a limited edition of 5,000 copies. The company reissued the score on CD as a wide release in June 2019, but with the previous CD's four bonus tracks omitted.

Release/Reception/Box Office: Warner Bros. released the film in cinemas across the United States on June 7, 1985.

The Goonies was first released on VHS and Betamax video in the United States in March 1986 and the LaserDisc and CED versions also debuted that year. Warner Home Video released a theatrical widescreen laserdisc on January 29, 1992. Warner Home Video released The Goonies in widescreen on Region 1DVD on August 21, 2001. Warner Home Video released The Goonies on Blu-ray Disc in October 2008 in Europe and November 2010 in North America. The video is in 1080p high-definition VC-1 and accompanied by a Dolby TrueHD soundtrack. Warner released the film on Ultra HD Blu-ray in September 2020 in North America.

Roger Ebert gave the film three stars out of four and called the film "a smooth mixture of the usual ingredients from Steven Spielberg action movies, made special because of the high-energy performances of the kids who have the adventures." Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune also awarded three stars out of four and wrote that after a dull start "some kind of minor movie miracle takes place, and The Goonies gets its act together as the kids stop trading wisecracks and get closer to finding their long-lost pirate treasure, thereby to help save their parents' homes. Only then do we accept The Goonies for what it is—a funny juvenile windup toy about kids in perilous, comic-book situations." Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote that the film "has a kind of breakneck pacing that keeps it fast, funny, ingenious, entertaining, and — only a small point while the movie is in progress — almost entirely without staying power." Variety called it "a dangerous Disneyland sort of a film stamped with the Steven Spielberg style of high fun. Like other Spielberg summer extravaganzas, pic is a roller coaster ride best enjoyed as it's speeding along. Once it stops to consider the sacred state of adolescence, it becomes painfully syrupy." Michael Wilmington of the Los Angeles Times wrote that the film "resembles nothing so much as a wildly exaggerated fun-fair ride, one that keeps comically exposing you to dangers, comically pulling you away, then, finally, with a shivering plop, deposits you on dry land, in the bosom of your family." Paul Attanasio of The Washington Post called it "an artfully crafted movie, thrumming with energy and sometimes wit, and utterly uninvolving for anyone over the age of 12."

Colin Greenland reviewed The Goonies for White Dwarf #73, and stated, "The Goonies I was unable to enjoy because of a bunch of kids yelling and screaming all the way through. Not the audience, the actors."

Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 77% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 60 reviews and 91% of the audience giving it a positive review; the average rating is 6.5/10. The critical consensus: "The Goonies is an energetic, sometimes noisy mix of Spielbergian sentiment and fun-house tricks that will appeal to kids and nostalgic adults alike." At Metacritic it has a rating score of 62 based on 13 reviews, indicating "generally favourable reviews".

The Goonies grossed $9 million in its opening weekend in the U.S., second on the charts behind Rambo: First Blood Part II. It grossed $63.9 million in the United States and Canada, placing it among the top-10 highest-grossing films of 1985 and $60.6 million overseas for a worldwide gross of $124 million.

My Review:

This is a terrific movie with a great cast that's just so fun to watch and this movie was part of my childhood...it was originally written by Steven Spielberg which was handed to 'Richard Donner' to direct it which was no problem at all because this still feel like a straight up Steven Spielberg movie especially the way it was all shot with the awesome cinematography. Each actor and actress has their own terrific character who are very fun and lovable to watch that would just make your day...and my most favourite characters are 'Chunk' and 'Data'...Chunk makes me laugh so much because of the funny stuff that just comes out his mouth and how clumsy he is, and 'Data' is the cool kid who has a cool utility belt that can do awesome stuff...and I remember when I was little I use to make an utility belt like his but made out of cardboard just so I could be like his character because he was just so cool. But yea this movie is one of the things that led the show 'Stranger Things' to happen because of this movie including Steven Spielberg's 'E.T.' and I'm glad this movie existed. So yea you can just look up the story line of this movie online before you watch it which would save me explaining it all out to you guys and all I can say is that this is a straight up classic that you can't go wrong with but who ever give this movie a 1 star out of 5 must be off their heads who obviously didn't grow up with this movie but if this is your first watch and enjoyed it then you have a very good taste and understand what a real movie truly is. This movie will never die and as they say in this movie 'GOONIES NEVER SAY DIE'.

Overall, I highly recommend this movie if you haven't watched it already - I mean I'm sure you have it would be a crime if you haven't - 10/10.

{Cyndi Lauper's song 'Good Enough' is the BEST song on the soundtrack}