There were woods behind the house where I grew up. I did not dare go in them during the summer due to the high probability of snakes and other critters enjoying the Alabama heat. When it turned fall, however, I was a regular visitor, even though I could not stray too far and had to keep my house in sight. The woods had this small rock formation with a little dugout, and I used that as a “fort” and “base of operations” for whatever I happened to be imagining that day. I named it “Fort Smith” because originality and creativity were lacking in my younger years. Those woods provided a lot of fun times on the weekends in the fall, but I did always wish they would have lead to some type of fantastical adventure, much like the one the kids in “The Goonies” experienced. 

“The Goonies”, Richard Donner’s 1985 film about a group of kids in Astoria, Oregon trying to find pirate treasure while also saving their neighborhood from becoming a golf course, was my favorite movie during childhood. It is still one of my favorite movies, and it is the example I use to let people know it is okay to still love what you loved as a child. You do not have to completely give up on things that brought you joy in your youth, even if that is supposed to be what you do as an adult. I have dealt with too many killjoys in my time on this planet who think that way, and I have very little time for them. Like a lot of kids that grew up in the suburbs in the 1980s, “The Goonies” spoke to a sense of wonder and adventure that could be right around the corner in your backyard. Who saw this movie and did not want to go hunting for buried treasure?

For a movie produced by Steven Spielberg and aimed at a young audience, “The Goonies” opens with a rather dark setting. Jake Fratelli (Robert Davi) is seen hanging in a jail cell in an apparent suicide, but it is all part of a ruse to escape the prison. He is met outside the jail by his brother Francis (Joe Pantoliano) and his menacing Mama (Anne Ramsey), and the Fratelli’s are soon the target of a high speed police chase through the “Goon Docks of Astoria. As the opening credits and Dave Grusin’s wonderful score play, The Fratelli’s and police race past various character we will soon get to know. Two of these characters are Mikey Walsh (Sean Astin) and Brandon “Brand” Walsh (Josh Brolin. Mikey is in the dumps due to his family and all the other families in the Goon Docks being forced to move out of their homes so Elgin Perkins (Curt Hanson) can foreclose on the land for the benefit of the Astoria Country Club. 

Mikey and Brand are soon joined by Mikey’s friends, collectively known as “The Goonies”. They include fast talking “Mouth” (Corey Feldman), invention happy Data (Ke Huy Quan), and Chunk (Jeff Cohen), the clumsy overweight kid who loves to tell a tall tale, much to the chagrin of everyone else. While hanging out at the Walsh’s house and ending up in the attic where local museum artifacts are being stored, the kids happen to discover an old pirate treasure map encased in glass. This discovery ignites something inside of Mikey. The map calls to him. He recalls the story of One Eyed Willy, told to him by his father, and then learns of Chester Copperpot, a local who went searching for Willy’s treasure but went missing. No matter the danger or potential the treasure might not be real, Mikey is determined to go searching for it and “save” the Goon Docks by finding One Eyed Willy’s “rich stuff”. 

“The Goonies” then turns into a treasure quest movie where Mikey, Brand, and the rest of their friends, including Andy (Keri Green), Brand’s love interest, and Stephanie (Martha Plimpton), Andy’s best friend, find themselves under a restaurant owned by the Fratelli’s and on the trail for One Eyed Willy’s treasure Mikey’s drive keeps the group going in light of every possible reason to turn back. Various obstacles, both man-made and natural, test their determination and spirit. Chunk ends up abducted by the Fratelli’s and in the company of “Sloth" (John Matuszak), the deformed but kind-hearted son of Mama Fratelli. The Fratelli’s end up hunting for the treasure as well. This movie has a lot of plot happening in a relatively short 114 minute runtime.  

I cannot recall the first time I watched “The Goonies”. It must have come after the summer of 1985 when the film transitioned from the theaters and to the shelves of local video stores. The film’s presence at a local video store provided for a funny family story. My mother went to rent the video for my sister and I. When she got home and played it, it did not take us long to realize this movie was not “The Goonies”. We definitely could not recall a little green monster popping out of the toilet. Due to miscommunication on someone’s part, and that part is lost to time, my mother walked away from the video story with a copy of one of the sequels to “The Ghoulies”. True story. 

I have loved “The Goonies” since watching it as a child. When I was younger, Chunk was my favorite character. His line proclaiming his friends can call him “Captain Chunk” always put a smile on my face and still does to this day. Any time Chunk (Or any of the characters) got to say a cuss word, though, made me laugh. It made me laugh a lot. Data was another character I loved as a kid and still do to this day. In my late 20s, I spent weeks putting together a proper Data costume for Halloween. I tried to account for every little detail, but I came up short on finding a way to do “slick shoes”. People still yelled “Fifty dollar bill” at me throughout the evening, and that was well worth the effort put into the costume. 

The film’s settings of Astoria, Oregon and shooting locations of nearby Cannon Beach and Ecola State Park are also incredibly important to me. I have had the pleasure of visiting the Pacific Northwest many times, and I always find myself going to Cannon Beach and Astoria as much as I can, no matter the distance. There is something magical about visiting Haystack Rock on Cannon Beach and see it jut out fro the Pacific Ocean. Ecola Point in Ecola State Park, the place where Mikey and his friends first put eyes on the Fratelli’s restaurant and starting point of their quest, provides the most beautiful view I have ever seen on this planet. A picture I took from that view hangs prominently in my room. I also recently got to share that location with my parents, sister, and brother-in-law during a family vacation to the Pacific Northwest. 

One scene in particular, however, speaks to me louder than the rest and is the emotional center of the film. Mikey and his friends find themselves underneath a wishing well with an opportunity to escape, thus meaning their quest to find One Eyed Willy’s gold would end. As they prepare to go up a bucket being controlled by Troy Perkins (Steve Antin), the spoiled son of Elgin Perkins, Mikey has an epiphany. He and his friends made it further than Chester Copperpot. Mikey knows this for certain since they recently discovered Copperpot’s corpse laying under a boobytrapped boulder. Mikey uses this rally his friends with his iconic “Our Time” speech. 

"Don't you realize? The next time you see sky, it'll be over another town. The next time you take a test, it'll be in some other school. Our parents, they want the best of stuff for us. But right now, they got to do what's right for them. Because it's their time. Their time! Up there! Down here, it's our time. It's our time down here. That's all over the second we ride up Troy's bucket.”
-Mikey Walsh

Mikey knows they cannot give up and take Troy’s bucket back to the surface. It will all be over. The treasure is still out there, and the Goon Docks need to be saved. It is up to them to save the Goon Docks. Mikey becomes the leader in that moment, and everyone continues to the quest because there is no other choice if they want to keep calling the Goon Docks home.  

This leads to the film’s conclusion where, of course, the kids find One Eyed Willy’s ship, the Inferno. Donner did not let anyone see the ship before the scene was shot, so the audience is blessed with genuine reactions as Mikey and his friends lay eyes on the pirate ship for the first time. The moment is triumphant and sets up a rather emotional scene where Mikey finds the skeleton of One Eyed Willy. I still get chills when Mikey speaks to him and calls Willy the first Goonie. Even though the Fratelli’s spoil the fun and the fate of the treasure is left up in the air (I’m not going to spoil EVERYTHING), Mikey is vindicated. He found One Eyed Willy. He found the treasure. 

If Mikey and his friends could find the pirate treasure and save their home, surely we all could find treasure in our backyards or woods or wherever we decided to explore as kids. It was at least worth looking and imagining the possibilities. There might not have been physical treasure out there, but for fans of “The Goonies”, the real treasure is the memories this film gave us. The lines, the action set pieces, the music, the setting. Everything. Mikey mentions the whole Inferno is a treasure. “The Goonies”, the whole movie”, is a treasure, and I am glad I went on the quest to discover it. 

Goonies Never Say Die.  

This review is part of my Letterboxd 4 series showcasing my 4 all-time favorite movies.

The Goonies 
(Richard Donner, 1985)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️