Stand By Me (Special Edition)
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Actor: Corey Feldman, Jerry O'Connell, Kiefer Sutherland, River Phoenix, Wil WheatonBrand: Sony
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); Portuguese (Subtitled); Chinese (Subtitled); Korean (Subtitled); Thai (Subtitled); English (Original Language); French (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language); Portuguese (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC, Special Edition, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen, 1.85:1
Running Time: 88 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2000-08-29
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
DVD Reviews of Stand By Me (Special Edition)
DVD Review: Journey of Self-Discovery
Summary: 5 Stars
This profanity-ridden 1986 Hollywood film is based on the novella "The Body" by Jewish-American writer Stephen King - the first and only time he didn't write something quirky. Perhaps it would've been another idiosyncratic Stephen King film had it not been for the excellent directing by Rob Reiner? Stand By Me is good, very good. It should become one of the Hollywood Club's classics, but many of today's generation never heard of it - and that's a shame. The acting is superb. The viewer's emotional involvement with the characters is accomplished with a minimum of dialogue - Rob Reiner wastes no footage here. It's about four 12 year old boys in a small Oregon town, three of whom nearly qualify as misfits by middle class standards, who hear about a dead body and decide to set out on an overnight expedition to find it before anyone else does.
The film opens with one of the lads grown into adulthood, Gordie Lachance (played by Richard Dreyfuss) sitting in his car reading a newspaper obituary of one of the other lads "Attorney Christopher Chambers Fatally Stabbed in Restaurant", page C-3, The Oregonian, Wednesday, September 4, 1985. He begins to reminisce about the time they set out to find the dead body - "I was 12 going on 13 the first time I saw a dead human being. It happened in the Summer of 1959, a long time ago".
The adult Gordie Lachance played by Richard Dreyfuss becomes the film's narrator as he recounts his childhood adventure. The 1959 adventure begins when Vern Tessio (played by Jerry O'Connell) is under his front porch digging small holes in the hopes of discovering the spot where he had buried a jar full of pennies, overhears his older brother and his friend talking about the Dodge car that they stole, and hears they saw a boy that is probably the one that the news has been broadcasting as missing for last three days. He hears them deduce that Ray Brauer must've been hit by a train when he when off to pick blueberries. Vern runs to his friends hanging out in a treehouse with the news that if they follow the tracks, they can find a body.
His friends are Teddy Duchamp (played by Corey Feldman), Gordie Lachance (played by Wil Wheaton), and Chris Chambers (played by River Phoenix). Teddy Duchamp reacts by exclaiming that Ray Brauer was "our age" and they decide to do an overnight 20-mile expedition down the train tracks and locate one of their own fallen pre-teens. They tell their parents that they are doing sleepovers at each other's houses - and in keeping with the cannon-fodder Hoopieville ways of their parents, none of the parents bother to phone the other parents to check any of this out. Many blue-collar working class communities were that way during the 50s, 60s, 70s, and even 80s. Many of those older generations can relate to the film's time period and to the characters' behaviors.
As these 4 lads make their way down the train tracks, we learn that three of them are suffering from a problem environment exacerbated by problem parents. Gordie is grieving the death of his older brother 4 months previous, while suffering nightmares in which his father says "It should've been you Gordon". Chris is suffering from low self-esteem resulting from the stigma of being a member of a worthless family headed by an alcoholic gun-keeping father (whose pistol Chris has brought along). Teddy's father was even more abusive than Chris's dad - he was committed to an insane asylum after an abusive attack on Teddy. Teddy, in turn, tells everyone his dad died storming the beach at Normandy on D-Day, while being haunted by the fact that he has a "loonie" for a dad. Vern is the only one of the bunch that is not suffering from some emotional trauma - while the others are cussing away at the absurdities in their lives Vern fondly sings the praises of "cherry-flavored PEZ".
These troubled kids represent real kids that had similar problems growing up in Baby Boomer working-class towns and many of the older generations will relate. Today's generation will find it difficult to relate to these boys - they have no cell phones, no handheld computer games, no rap or hip-hop. But the boys do encounter a junkyard dog with a vicious reputation, a train dodge on a trestle (not by choice), coyotes, leeches, and teen-aged bullies with a knife-wielding ring leader "Ace" (played by Keifer Sutherland). The campfire tale about "Lard Ass" is hilarious.
When the boys do find the body, the bullies show up and pull a knife on Chris. Gordie shoots Chris's dad's pistol into the air, then aims it at "Ace" the ringleader. The bullies leave. In the end, the boys decide to anonymously phone in the location of Ray Brauer's body. The prize of finding the body was not as important as was the prize of self-discovery.
The adult Gordie played by Richard Dreyfuss concludes by mentioning how though he hadn't seen Chris in 10 years, he will miss him. And this touches on the American male's general inability to make deep friendships beyond childhood. If we don't keep our childhood friends, we're lucky to have even one who we can be as close with as we were when we were young, vulnerable, and bonded together in confronting life's absurdities. Gordie misses Chris; we miss our childhood friends. A very sentimental movie that is unfortunately timebound. Kudos to the Hollywood Gang for this one!
Description of Stand By Me (Special Edition)
In a small woodsy Oregon town, a group of friends--sensitive Gordie (Wil Wheaton), tough guy Chris (River Phoenix), flamboyant Teddy (Corey Feldman), and scaredy-cat Vern (Jerry O'Connell)--are in search of a missing teenager's body. Wanting to be heroes in each other's and their hometown's eyes, they set out on an unforgettable two-day trek that turns into an odyssey of self-discovery. They sneak smokes, tell tall tales, cuss 'cause it's cool and band together when the going gets tough. When they encounter the town's knife-wielding hoods who are also after the body, the boys discover a strength they never knew they had. Stand by Me is a rare and special film about friendship and the indelible experiences of growing up. Filled with humor and suspense, Stand by Me is based on the novella 'The Body' by Stephen King.Bestsellers in DVD
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