Stand By Me 1986

     This film is an adaptation of a Stephen King short story titled The Body.  It is one of four stories released in the novel Different Seasons of 1982.  The setting of this film is the summer of 1959 over Labor Day weekend in Castlerock Oregon.  Four boys are 12 years old and good friends.  Gordie, Chris, Teddy and Vern.  Another group of boys are older and they are teens.  They are Ace, Billy Charlie and Eyeball.  A local boy they know has been missing for several days.  The boys set off into the woods to see if they can find him.  They think he’s dead, a train may have hit him and they are looking for his body.  They tell each one of their parents a different story so they can get away to search overnight. 

     This is a different time period where boys could go out into the woods and get away with it.  People could leave their doors unlocked and there was a lot of constant play for kids.  There was friction between the boys but they settled the problems.  Sometimes the younger boys got into it with the teens but they settled those problems too.  Teens with cars were wild but the number of cars on the roads was very low.  3 1/2* (I liked this movie)

89 min, Adventure directed by Rob Reiner with Wil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman, Jerry O’Connell, Kiefer Sutherland, Casey Siemaszko, Gary Riley, Bradley Gregg, Jason Oliver, Marshall Bell, Frances Lee McCain.

Note:  Imdb 8.1 out of 10, 91% critic 94% audience on Rotten Tomatoes, Amazon 4.7* out of 5* with 1408 reviews, Metacritic 75 out of 100 with 20 critics 8.8* out of 10* with 25 reviews, Empire Online 5*.

Special Note:  Filmed in Burney, McCloud, Yreka and Pasadena, California; Cottage Grove, Brownsville, Veneta, Eugene and Junction City, Oregon.  Actors Phoenix, Feldman, Wheaton and O’Connell got into a lot of trouble in the hotel where they were staying during filming.  They fixed the video games in the lobby so they could play without paying.  They covered Sutherland’s car in mud but they didn’t know it was his car.  Reiner is a non-smoker and the cigarettes smoked by the boys were made from cabbage leaves.  All of the actors both boys and teens went on to make other movies.