E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial 20th Anniversary Edition *** ½
Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Written by: Melissa Matheson
Starring: Henry Thomas, Dee Wallace, Drew Barrymore, Peter Coyote, Robert MacNaughton, and Erika Eleniak (betcha didn’t know THAT.)
Rated PG (If you don’t know why, I’m not the person who should be telling you)
I was tempted to give this zero stars – not because of the quality of the film, but simply because with something like E.T., stars are irrelevant.
Seriously – it’s pretty much a classic, like It’s A Wonderful Life or The Wizard of Oz or The Princess Bride. A critic’s opinion really doesn’t matter that much. Especially in a re-release. I don't think it's Speilberg trying to get more money. This is something that should be re-released periodically.
If for some reason you are completely unaware of what one of the highest-grossing films of all time is about, if you’ve lived your whole life without hearing the phrase “E.T. phone home,” if you thought that Drew Barrymore’s first role was in Scream, I want you to shut of your computer right now and go to the nearest theatre that is showing this film. For those of you who just want a quick refresher, here we go.
An alien is stranded on Earth. His family left because they were in danger. Things were coming through the forest where they were collecting plants. The things were loud and had bright lights. The aliens waited as long as they could for their brother, but couldn’t wait any longer, so they had to leave. The alien makes his way out of the forest and into a tool shed. A boy named Elliot (Thomas) finds him in the shed, but no one believes him. He shows the alien (later named E.T.) to his brother Michael (MacNaughton), and sister Gertie (Barrymore), who swear that E.T. will be their secret. Gertie, however, is 4. And talkative. And friendly. Oh, and those things in the woods? Government agents. They were looking for E.T., too. E.T. wants to go home. Elliot wants to help him, but wants E.T. to stay, too.
The question you’re probably asking yourself is: should I go and see this ‘new’ version? If you’ve never seen it before, yes. Absolutely. If you have seen it before, it’s entirely up to you. Nothing is really added to make the story deeper or more compelling. E.T. does look better in this version, thanks to Industrial Light and Magic doing subtle cgi work on his face. If you’ve only seen it on TV or video, you really do owe it to yourself to see it on the big screen. The soundtrack is absolutely pristine, even if they did cut Neil Diamond’s “Heartlight” from the closing credits.
Yes, yes, that’s all well and good, you’re thinking. But what did you think of the movie, Mr. Critic?
That’s a very good question. I remember seeing it back in 1982. I was 4 or 5. I must have liked it, because I had all kinds of E.T. stuff – coloring books, figurines, things like that. But it never impacted me the way that Star Wars did. Now that I’m 20 years older, and have studied film, I can see it from different angles. This was Speilberg’s first ‘serious’ movie, as I see it. He’d made Jaws and Raiders of the Lost Ark at this point, as well as Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I consider Close Encounters to be his first sci-fi movie. While it was ‘serious’, it wasn’t aiming at the same target as most of his other works.
Speilberg has never forgotten what it’s like to be a boy. That’s why he was able to make the Indiana Jones series and Jurassic Park work – the Gee-Whiz factor in those movies could only be achieved by someone who is still 12. Stuff blowing up is cool. Adventure is cool. Dinosaurs are VERY cool. Girls are kinda neat, too. But, it seems that in E.T., he also remembered that being a kid sucks. Adults don’t listen to you, big brothers are jerks (I know – I am one), little sisters are annoying (I know – I have one), school is damn near intolerable – looking back, it’s easy for adults to forget things like that.
In E.T., Speilberg starts to work on some of his issues. He already started fighting Nazis in Raiders of the Lost Ark. In E.T., he starts dealing with fatherhood issues. Elliot’s dad is in Mexico. With his girlfriend. Speilberg was raised by his mother. Elliot wants to hang out and play Dungeons and Dragons with his brother and his brother’s friends, but they won’t let him. Speilberg was the only Jewish kid in his neighborhood. Abandonment and being an outsider show up again and again in his work, but it seems that he starts dealing with them in E.T. As such, it’s not incredibly subtle.
He has his trademark shots of people looking. He has the John Williams score in place. Everything that we associate with Steven Speilberg is there; it’s just not as refined as it will become. When E.T. leaves (if that’s a spoiler, shame on you for not having seen this movie in the first place. 20 years not long enough for you?), he’s clearly looking for tears. Not subtle at all. Is that a bad thing? Nope. It’s a family movie. Sometimes you need to bring out the big brush to get things across.
It’s a family movie, and it has the guts to not sugarcoat everything. Sometimes people say bad words. Sometimes adults just don’t listen to you. Adults aren’t bad; they just don’t always remember what it’s like to be a kid. If you are a parent, please, take your children to see this movie. If you have seen it already, see it in a theatre. It’s nice to see that the film doesn’t feel dated in the least. You might want to think twice about eating that pack of Reese’s Pieces you have from the original premiere, however.
