Los exploradores

I remember seeing this movie as a kid. It was great from the start, and I just _drank_ the whole movie in. It kept being great great great great - until they reached the spaceship. Leonard Maltin's description of this as "a disastrous wrong turn in space" is putting this mildly. I HATED this part of a movie, even as a kid.

Probably still worth watching - that is, if you prepare yourself for a climax that really sucks!

The '80s yielded a number of movies about kids going on adventures, but "Explorers" was something else. On the surface, it seems like any other movie, but the aliens aren't what anyone is expecting. Mostly, the movie is about Ben Crandall (Ethan Hawke), Wolfgang Muller (River Phoenix) and Darren Woods (Jason Presson), and their fantasies.

And then there are director Joe Dante's touches. Dick Miller - whom Dante always casts - plays a cop who discovers the boys' spaceship. Robert Picardo (another frequent Dante player) voices one of the aliens. And of course Dante has many allusions to '50s B-movies. Maybe "Explorers" isn't anything special, but it's still pretty fascinating.

It just occurred to me, this would be a GREAT movie to do a fan edit on. Tone the goofy stuff way down, etc. I just might try it...

It's rather notorious for having one of the worst third acts because it started so wonderfully. Ethan Hawke and River Phoenix teamed together, the cop that wasn't a bad guy, etc etc.

Then-- they met the aliens. Terrible terrible.

Hawke's performance when they're on the alien ship is very authentically "this sucks." It's sad, but it's how we feel too. And his performance is so spot on, I'm skeptical studio interference impacted this movie as much as the director claims.

It's not just the alien sequence is so tonally inconsistent, the pop culture references the aliens use are 20 to 30 years to old for the target demographic. I was about the age of these kids when it came out, and even now am hopelessly bored during the sequence because though I generally recognize the pop references, it's only in a clinical way.

I will give it one prop though-- the alien ship act is so bizarre, when they come back to earth, it really feels like they've been somewhere, for a much longer time than they actually were.

Watching Explorers as a kid, sparked all the things I loved about freedom, and adventure. I was always into space, sci-fi, computers, and aliens even at a young age, and this film does a great job geeking any kid out when it comes to science, space, and adventure. I love how one of the kids had a dream about designing a circuit board, and after creating it realizes it creates a spherical force field that has virtually no speed limit, and is impossible to slow down (blasting through an entire stack of books with ease, leaving a perfect hole).

Although, once the kids get through the testing phase of the force field, and build the ship from old carnival rides (tea-cup thingie)--the movie takes another turn. Although still fun, the writer and/or director seem to lose track of the original flare, and the movie begins to wander off into a more childish, meaningless Hollywood push-out.

Over all, the film is very entertaining. I just Netflixed it so that my girlfriend could see it, and I could reminisce. It is one of my favorite childhood movies (along side the original Neverending Story).

--MR

wow. i love this film. i saw it when i was pretty young and absolutely loved it, as i do much of Dante's flicks from this time - The Burbs, Gremlins, InnerSpace - and i still love it to this very day. in fact, i understand the ending a little better now. i remember the ending being quite disappointing in some senses - the aliens just dont live up to the majesty that proceeds them - but this is exactly how the main character played by Ethan Hawke feels. So in some senses this could be seen as truly amazing film-making. But maybe i am being a little silly through my love of the film, which also i must add, has one of the best themes. A theme which only arrives half way through the film, when their craft is almost finished in its building. I love this film, but i can understand that some people may not enjoy it or even find it to be that good a film. I of course dont agree with this in any way - and less than 6/10? Outrageous. it deserves at least 7 anyway. But nevertheless, people have their opinions, and in mine i shall give it 8.5/10.