The year was 1985; the setting, a drive-in theater in upstate New York. The movie on the screen was Steven Spielberg’s E.T., and we had come to the moment—you know the one—where E.T. says goodbye. He places his glowing finger on Elliott’s heart; he croaks, “I’ll be right here”; he ascends to the vessel where his friends are waiting to welcome him home. The music swells, and the spaceship looks like a jewel as it soars away into the night sky, and I—three years old, wearing footed pajamas, high on sugar and the thrill of still being awake hours after my usual bedtime—had never seen anything so cool. The alien! The spaceship! The action! The adventure!
It was just too bad that my parents clearly hadn’t enjoyed the movie very much, seeing as they were both crying.
Such is the magic of the family film: It can move adults of all ages, while delighting any children they may or may not be chaperoning.
