Cocoon (1985)

Very disappointing...

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

What could have been a simple disaster movie took a late turn into the depths of mysteriousness and emotional ignorance. Like a horrible aftertaste, Cocoon starts out well and turns sour halfway into the meal. What Jaws (1975) did, Ron Howard decided not to do. Trading in simplicity for a screenplay of old people and aliens, he attempts to weave a tale of redemption and fate, instead finding himself directing an action movie with no purpose.In fact, this movie has no purpose whatsoever. It says nothing, it accomplishes nothing, and it does nothing. It's a story for telling a story's sake. But where Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) tells a story because of the existence of the story, Cocoon must search out the material to make the story. And the screenplay looks long and hard for that inspiration for a good story – and gives up. So we get a movie with old people and aliens. A story where old people of Earth have more in common with aliens from some distant planet (that have apparently been to Earth already, explaining certain human legends) than with their own kind. But where E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) makes good use of moral children and friendly aliens, this movie decides to attempt to make a sentimental story with a stupid child and indulgent aliens. But wait…there's more! Don't forget the necessary, underdeveloped, and makes-no-sense-whatsoever love story – in this case between a human and an alien.The beginning was decent however. Howard attempts to construct a slowly building tense storyline of gradually revealed twists. Which works until it feels like the movie should end at around the 80 minute mark instead of the 120 minute mark. The slow sci-fi drama of the first half is quickly overshadowed by the feel-good catastrophe of the second half.Don Ameche was decent, but I think the Academy has something for old people, like Art Carney in Harry and Tonto (1974). While good performances, do they deserve the Academy Award? The visual effects were good for the time and not abused unlike many an action and sci-fi movie of today, not to name names. If only Howard could have kept the slow build up going, like Arrival (2016), he would have had a fine classic entry into the 80s sci-fi movie collection. Now, we just have Cocoon, the classically bad movie.

The freaking Life on Mars psychosis of the 80's. First Close Encounters of the Third Kind, then E.T., then this. Common. And the music it's so... how to say, 'you have to believe'. May I suggest this kind of scenario works better for kids than for adults.Spoiler alert.And where are those grannies going to go? How would you know that that big interstellar ship won't break in the way letting those folks flying in the middle of the galaxy with no medic care and soap operas reception? Really. I know for a fact that there's no Champs Elysees on planet Antarea. Anyhow, the film is saved by the - for once - very nice and slow to get angry E.T.'s, admirably nice and easy going. And to call Tahnee Welch sweet and hot is just to use more pleonasms than is needed.Cocoon is cheesy and careless, and in my book also useless. How better would have been to dump the martians, and just let it be a history for older people with a similar scenario. That's what I would've bought.

The Citizen Kane of Ron Howard's directorial career has to be and still is Cocoon. It's a film that combines fantasy and science fiction better than any ever done before or since and it's the most life affirming item you'll ever see on the big screen or small. It also gives some of our older players some really fine roles and brought an Oscar late in his career to one of the class acts of Hollywood.The citizens of one of thousands of nursing homes are just whiling away the end hours of their lives and in Florida there's more of these homes than most places. Three of those citizens are Wilford Brimley, Hume Cronyn and Don Ameche. One of their activities is to go into an indoor swimming pool in a vacant house next door.But those activities are interrupted when four strangers, Brian Dennehy, Linda Harrison, Clint Howard, and Tyrone Power IV rent the place. It's that swimming pool that interests them. The quartet also rents Steve Guttenberg's boat and they bring up some large size boulder type rocks which they place in the pool.Our senior citizens keep going into the pool even with the rocks there and pretty soon they're noticing some marvelous changes, in Hume Cronyn, the most marvelous of all as his cancer goes into a complete remission, mystifying his doctors. That leads our group now joined by wives Jessica Tandy and Maureen Stapleton for Cronyn and Brimley and companion Gwen Verdon for Ameche that these are some special people.Special they are, humans they're not as the quartet shows them they're aliens in human body suits. And after some heartache and tragedy for both earth people and aliens, the aliens offer these old folks a chance never given to any humans before. For that you see Cocoon for.This is the kind of film that you can watch over and over and still feel good about yourselves and feel good that there are others out there in the vast universe who've played the game of life and have mastered the rules. There are so many other science fiction films that show monsters and other worldly creatures coming to earth with the most malicious of intentions. Cocoon is such a refreshing change.Cocoon got two Oscars in 1985 for special effects and a Best Supporting Actor Award for Don Ameche. In a sense it was wrong to single out Ameche because all the senior citizen players cut some fine characters that you'll remember and enjoy. But Ameche was always a class act in Hollywood, a person you'll not hear an unkind word about written or spoken by his contemporaries in a career that lasted from the Thirties to the Nineties. It was an award for a lifetime more than anything else.One of those characters also was Jack Gilford. There's a famous classic Twilight Zone episode which also takes place in a senior citizen home where the residents there are given the same chance as these people are. With a lot less attention I might add. Gilford fulfills the same function as Russell Collins did in The Twilight Zone, the one who stays behind because he can't bring himself to take the step necessary.Who knows how long or if humankind will approach what these aliens have, but in many ways Cocoon offers a peak into an existence more fabulous than ever portrayed on film before.

Cocoon could have been very depressing and parts of it are very emotional and sad but beautifully handled. It deals with subjects that are quite difficult to sell - being old, facing the death of loved ones or coming to the end of your own time. However thankfully its also very funny contains great well rounded characters and has some great music from James Horner. Steve Guttenbergs character owns a boat and does crappy tours but is struggling to make ends meet and is down on his luck. Enter four mysterious strangers asking him to take them to a certain point in the ocean with no questions asked. He agrees and while spying on the pretty female played by Tahnee Welch (mmmmm!) he finds out they are actually Aliens retrieving Cocoons containing their friends that have lain at the bottom of the sea for thousands of years. Intercutting with this we have the story of an old peoples home and a group of friends biding their time until death takes them as it takes the people around them one by one. Three life long friends (Ameche, Brimley and Cronin)sneak into a local pool and relax but one day find the pool full of cocoons. After their swim they gain a new lease of life - they all get their libido back, their health and their sense of joy in life. I won't go into detail but what made this an enjoyable film for me was the characters. Each of the friends had their own background, their own questions and concerns as to what was happening and their new lease of life had a different effect on each of them. For example I loved how Hume Cronins character at the beginning was dying of cancer - you felt sorry for him as a sick old man, then when the pool cures him you find out as he gets his sex drive back he has an eye for the ladies and cheats on his wife and that its not the first time as he has treat her badly this way before. I also loved the relationship between Wilford Brimleys character and Barret Oliver. You felt a real grandfather - grandson bond between them. Special mention to the other friend in the group - the eternally grouchy Bernie who refuses to go in the pool or let his sick wife. After the old folks run rampant the energy from the cocoons is drained and the pool stops working its magic - then Bernies wife dies and he Carry's her to the pool begging for it to bring her back. Its pretty heart wrenching stuff for the likes of me. Thankfully though although sometimes I did have a tear in my eye there was some laughter to go along with it. The interplay between the old folks is very funny and its a joy to see them change from old codgers to teenagers overnight and I find Steve Guttenberg amusing as well. Overall I found Cocoon a very entertaining film. Emotional, sad, beautiful, funny and above all memorable. Sadly most of the cast is gone but through their work they live on.