Ebert told me most of my favorite 80's movies including THE EVIL DEAD (how do you miss the clever lo-fi filmmaking?) were bad but THE GOLDEN CHILD was awesome.
You're being willfully obtuse and denying that THE THING s considered a classic today and that it's box office failure was due to critics like Ebert's very deep "it's the barf-bag movie of summer." Yeah, that's shitty criticism and fits with Rex Reed. Ebert's been objectively wrong at the start...
Movies like THE THING and BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA and EVIL DEAD and so many others could have used a critic's help. Ebert loved the awful THE GOLDEN CHILD and told people not to see the lovely BTILC. As an aware geek in the 80's, I knew Siskel and Ebert were hurting a lot of films now...
Ebert also gave thumbs-down to THE THING and most of the best 80's genre films. Lovely man, awful critic. I remember every single audience for all of those 80's summer of films. I've never seen an audience react as they did to GREMLINS or RAIDERS or TOD or BTTF. I was the TARGET for THE GOONIES...
I have no doubt another audience might react different and younger kids would eat it up. Yes it made money but the film promises a sequel that doesn't come and it was not well-reviewed. I watched audiences as much as the film growing up and you can tell when the film connects. I loved BIG...
I might check this out in 4K, but I was so caught up in Spielberg 80's fever I cut sophomore class to see this opening day -- and had my first major theatrical letdown. Not funny, racist (I was 13 and groaned at the Mexican maid scene) and Donner's typical uninspired direction bolstered by...