EXPLORERS (1985)

EXPLORERS (1985)

Tagline: You don't need a driver's license to reach the stars.

(Adventure, Family, Comedy) [PG]

Maybe it's a bunch of Amazon rainforest women that wanna breed a new race.

In this one, a young kid named Ben (played by Ethan Hawke) has a dream about coming across a schematic of something he knows is from outer space.  He takes it to his friend Wolfgang (played by River Phoenix) who quickly realizes what it is, translates it into something he can produce with a computer. The boys team up with Darren (played by Jason Presson, who was also in the disastrous SATURDAY THE 14TH STRIKES BACK), and decide to experiment with the discovery from Ben’s dream. Wolfgang just happens to have a makeshift lab and their findings reveal that they can travel inside a bubble of energy. In a short period of time, they build a craft partially made from an old amusement park ride. Before long they are being sucked into space? Why? How and by whom? What the crap is going on? 

Some decent points of this movie are the actual build-up. I found myself glued to my impractical, 80’s cheese-filled seat, with cheese popcorn, and cheese nachos interested in everything that was going on with these 3 kids. Their chemistry is really good and the acting is actually pretty solid. We even get a Dick Miller sighting and he rarely got involved in a project that didn’t rock in the ’80s. There is also a brief Amanda Peterson sighting in this movie. She is the main actress in CAN’T BUY ME LOVE in case you are not familiar with her. There are also some nice nods to the sci-fi movies of yesteryear and overall I was pleased with most of the start and middle of this movie. It had my attention, even with the complete nonsense science thrown in. 

If this movie was a football game it would be the one where your team is killing it right up till the 3rd quarter. I mean, like winning by 4 touchdowns, then, suddenly they fall apart and end up losing the game so badly you never want to even watch your team play again. That’s what’s going on with this damn thing. 

Sadly the last 30 minutes (give or take a few minutes) of this movie are so horrifyingly bad, it’s almost to the point where I had urges to just turn it off and not even do this review. I don’t want to give too much away if you love to suffer sometimes when you watch movies, but let’s just say the entire build-up is completely wasted. The performances that were good suddenly delve into the bottom of the barrel dialog with so much cringe I wanted to throw up about 4 times. All this is coming from a dude that loves cheesy, loves humor, and silliness. None of that lands in the last 30 minutes and we are stuck with the kind of terrible that takes months, if not years, to get out of your system. 

The young talent in this movie isn’t enough to rescue it from the depths of the level of dreadful movie-making we encounter in the finale. It’s like wading through a firestorm of one regrettable scene after another and having nothing but a remote between you and an instantaneous melting of your brain.  

Turn it off and run. I give this thing a 1 out of 7. We did at least get a decent first 3 quarters of a movie. Some very young kids might give this a 3 out of 7, but if they do, they probably haven’t been introduced to much of anything with quality. I can’t recommend this in the slightest. 

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF PARAMOUNT PICTURES AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY. 

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