Subject: Review: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)

From: Harvey S. Karten <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Mar 2002 20:15:41 -0000

E.T. THE EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL

 Reviewed by Harvey Karten
 Universal Pictures/Amblin Entertainment
 Director: Steven Spielberg
 Writer: Melissa Mathison
 Cast:Dee Wallace, Henry Thomas, Peter Coyote, Robert
MacNaughton, Drew Barrymore, K.C. Martel, Sean Frye, C.
Thomas Howell, Erika Eleniak, David M. O'Dell, Richard
Swingler
 Screened at:Loews E-Walk, NYC 3/23/02

   When the final curtain rang down on a Broadway performance
of Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman" one evening in 1949, an
executive type in the fifth row was heard to say to his wife, "I
always knew that New England route was no damn good."  Talk
about literal interpretations of theater!  I almost expected
someone in the audience for "E.T." to mumble, "I always told
you that the suburbs are the best place to bring up kids," which
may well be true considering the adorable family adopted by
Steven Spielberg for his blockbusting,
box-office-record-breaking 1982 film.  Now in its 20th
anniversary with just a few minutes added and a sprucing up of
John Williams' stirring score, "E.T." knocks 'em dead once
again, a film that is so visually and emotionally arresting the
darn thing takes your breath away.   

   What makes this fable a parable that compares favorably with
"The Wizard of Oz"?  You could mention ten-year-old Henry
Thomas's performance, perhaps the best rendetion by a kid at
any time on the silver screen of the power of imagination, the
very quality that begins to deteriorate once we reach junior high
school.  Then again, the greatness could be found in the
dramatic trajectory, the way director Steven Spielberg starts the
show ominously as though he were emulating David Lynch's
"Blue Velvet." as a group of sinister adults attempt to track down
something that's moving in the tall grass, and breaks up each
episode of high excitement with a period of character
exploration.  We can't fail to mention the astonishing visuals,
culminating in the world-famous scene of a boy on his bike
soaring over the California trees by the light of the moon.  Most
of all, I guess, "E.T." treats the subject of communication in a
way so stirring that few so-called adult films can match the
depiction of the empathy of a lonely boy, the product of a home
without a father and the butt of jokes of his older schoolmates,
as he connects famously with his mirror image from a distant
planet.

   The title character is a green, lizard-like creature with a neck
so flexible that he can rise from a figure about three and
one-half feet tall to one about a forehead higher than his new
young friend.  When his space vehicle takes off inadvertently
without him, the extra terrestrial feels as abandoned as does the
young lad, Elliott (Henry Thomas), and as a creature dependent
on the kindness of his ten-year-old host he evokes love and a
sense of responsibility in the little man and eventually in his
mom (Dee Wallace), his kid sister Gertie (Drew Barrymore) and
even the older guys in school who go along for the ride.

   Though the film bogs down for a while when E.T. has been
stricken and is placed on an operating table by doctors intent on
bringing him back for future experimentation, Spielberg's movie
effectively shows adults a world as seen from the point of view
of a excited boy, and while the kids in the audience are bound to
forget about fidgeting, the real winners are we old timers in the
audience who for a couple of hours are transported back to a
period in our lives that the clouds, the stars, and whole universe
are seen as though for the first time.

Rated PG.  Running time: 120 minutes.  (C) 2002 by
Harvey Karten, [email-masked]

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X-Language: en
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