'E.T.' still out of this world

JOHN ANDERSON, NEWSDAY

Originally published Monday, March 18, 2002

When E.T. first wanted to phone home, the only conventional method would have been AT&T. Ronald Reagan was president. Jack Valenti was running the Motion Picture Association of America -- see, not everything changes. For example: After 20 years, millions and millions of dollars and a whole lotta myth-making, the biggest movie of the 1980s -- and the fourth-ranked all-time box-office champ -- remains a gold mine.

The serious excavation, so to speak, begins this week. Although the original was released in June 1982, "E.T.: The Extraterrestrial: The 20th Anniversary" arrives in theaters Friday, a few months early, but facing little opposition (I mean, competition). The original cast will be out shilling for the revamped movie en masse, employing the customary platforms ("Today," "Access Hollywood," etc.). Ancillary products will be available -- if you're good -- for purchase. Director Steven Spielberg has called "E.T." his "most personal film"; I would have thought it was "Schindler's List," but who am I to argue with commerce? It certainly wouldn't do any good.

Although it's been given something of an overhaul by its director (the government agents no longer have guns; the word "terrorist" has been excised; the effects and sound have been enhanced), it's basically the same movie. How could it be otherwise? If you happen to be the type to recoil at the words "heart-warming," you will have every reason to run to see "Resident Evil" instead. You might have to, anyway, because "E.T." will be sold out.

The movie was huge, is huge, but can hardly be called one of the great films of all time. Like so much of Spielberg's work, it forgoes the time-consuming work (or art) of genuine emotional construction, relying instead on his audience's reflexive response to cinematic convention. Is there any substantial reason to believe the strength of the bond that exists between young Elliott and the walking walnut he calls E.T.? No, but we do -- because we want to. Because all the cues are there. And we react like Pavlov's dog.

At the same time, there are moments of real pathos -- Mom (Dee Wallace, now Dee Wallace Stone) reading "Peter Pan" to daughter Gertie (Drew Barrymore). Or Elliot (Henry Thomas), emboldened telekinetically by the beer E.T. has drunk, standing on another student's back and kissing his pretty blond classmate (Playboy Playmate-to-be Erika Eleniak). Or Mom simply not seeing E.T. as he hides among Elliot's toys, because there are some things kids can see that adults cannot.

The movie's kid's-eye view of the world is a "Peanuts"-inspired, adultless universe (except for Mom), where the faces of most adults -- including those of the threatening alien hunters -- are left unseen until the final act.

Inspired largely by "The Day the Earth Stood Still," "Peter Pan" and Charlie Chaplin (doesn't E.T. move like a Little Tramp?), the story is a parable about the persecution of the innocent, with all the blatant button-pushing and biblical allusions pointed toward a climax virtually guaranteed to reduce the susceptible to sobbing. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde on Dickens' "The Olde Curiosity Shop," only someone with a heart of stone would fail to laugh at the death of little E.T.

Believe me, I'm not giving anything away, even in the unlikely event that you've never seen the movie. If "E.T." signified anything, besides the beatification of the product plug (for Reese's Pieces, most successfully, but also Coke, Coors and Pez), it was the effectiveness of Spielberg's method, emotional manipulation honed to its bluntest edge. Coupled with the music of John Williams, which always has the subtle musicality of a car alarm at 3 a.m., "E.T." defined the watershed moment when Spielberg abandoned the adrenaline-and-Saturday-serial-fueled virtuosity of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (one of the top 25 money-makers and a great movie) for softer, more accessible and certainly less sophisticated flavor of filmmaking. For this reason alone, "E.T." merits a celebration as it turns 20. But perhaps "celebration" isn't exactly the right word.

The Olympian Copyright 2002

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