Stand By Me (DVD)

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In his commentary, director Rob Reiner throws off this little tidbit of rock 'n' roll history: "Stand By Me," by Ben E. King, remains the only song to reach #1 twice—once when it was originally released, and again when the exact same recording was re-released to coincide with the premier of the film.*

It's not surprising. That song, coupled with the film's epitaph—"I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, does anyone?"—has a powerful resonance, especially after spending 88 minutes with Gordie Lachance, Chris Chambers, Teddy Duchamp, and Vern Tessio. There's no shortage of coming-of-age books or films, but "Stand By Me" is perhaps the most memorable. It captures the full, paradoxical range of behavior that characterizes 12 year olds trying to find out who they are apart from their parents—which is why "Stand By Me" is also one of the few coming-of-age films to merit an "R" rating. It's not exactly role-modeling behavior they display—sneaking cigarettes, "borrowing" Dad's gun (while he's too drunk to notice), swearing their little fannies off, leaving home for two days, dodging freight trains, and locking horns with older teen bullies who happen to have switchblades. Then there's that dead body.

Two for Flinching!

"Stand By Me" is a classic quest tale, but the grail for these boys is the corpse of someone their own age—a boy named Ray Brower who was struck by a freight train. It was all over the news that police were still trying to locate the body when Vern (Jerry O'Connell) overhears his older punk brother talking about how their gang had a fix on the location and they were going to try to get to the body and make headlines themselves. So it becomes a race against time, in every sense of the word. As the younger group of boys move closer to that body and an inevitable confrontation, they leave more and more pieces of their innocence and childhood selves behind.

Chopper, Sic Balls!

This episodic '50s-era film is full of incidents and lines that stick with you, even many years later. As Gordie, Chris, Vern, and Teddy (Corey Feldman) grab their bedrolls and start their journey, one of their first stops is a junkyard rumored to be guarded by a dog trained to go right for the testicles. Mytho-dramatic moments like these are woven together with typical boy behavior that runs the manic-depressive gamut between hysterical horseplay and tears shed over their home lives and fears about their own shortcomings. Though they travel light, the foursome carries a ton of baggage. Gordie's older brother (and parents' favorite) died, leaving him feeling more alone than ever. Chris is the son of a drunken petty criminal whom everyone expects will grow up to be a loser himself. Vern is the fat kid that everybody picks on, and tired of it all. And the erratic Teddy is the son of a "looney." But in their little group—whether it's spending time in their treehouse or on adventures—they offer support, and never push the teasing to the danger point. What's incredible about the film is that the actors were all relative newcomers and needed to have on-the-set classes just to teach them the basics of acting, Reiner says. But with limited rehearsals, he was able to film many of the scenes with single, unbroken shots.

Leeches!

"Wow, you're the first person I've met who's fainted," Vern says after Gordie removes a big fat leech from his little privates—something we learn from Reiner that actually happened to author Stephen King, whose story, "The Body," was adapted for the film. Reiner says that the film's memorable dialogue exchanges come right out of the book, with the only major change he made a shift in focus. While the book gave more center stage to Chris (River Phoenix, in the film), Reiner wanted to use Gordie as the point-of-view character in order to better exploit and explore his own childhood memories—meaning, of course, that Reiner identified with Gordie (Wil Wheaton).

Hey Lardass, Chow Down, Wide Load!

It's interesting to hear Reiner say how he's not sure about the "barfarama" gross-out story that Gordie tells around the campfire to amuse his friends. Neither am I. It always seemed just a bit low-brow for a film that towed the line with more sophistication. But it was in King's book, Reiner says, and gross as it is, the story is certainly typical of what a 12-year-old boy might come up with, and it's certainly memorable. So, I would guess, is the image of the punk teens speeding along in their convertible playing "mailbox baseball," knocking mailboxes off their posts with monstrous swings of the bat. Though, of course, the most memorable scene from the film is where the boys attempt to cross a long railroad trestle that spans a 100-foot river gorge, with no place to escape if a train should happen along.

But as much as any of the memorable episodes, what sticks with you about this film is the right-on portrayal of boys interacting. There's the "your mom" insults, the merciless teasing, the gross-outs, the pinky swears and "skin its," and those non-stop conversations that ranged from the serious to the silly ("Who do you think would win in a fight? Mighty Mouse or Superman?"). The screenplay (which King said was the best adaptation of any of his books, to date) is superb, the acting is first-rate, the scenery and cinematography is gorgeous, the soundtrack is infectious, and the editing flawless. Ignore the barfarama scene which seems out of character for Gordie to narrate, throw in Kiefer Sutherland as head thug Ace and John Cusack as Gordie's dead brother (shown in dream and memory flashbacks), and it makes for one practically perfect film.