The New Movie of the Week: Honey, I Shrunk the Kids

Wayne Szalinski (Rick Moranis) is in the process of building a shrink ray although everything he tries to shrink just explodes.  His hyper-focused obsession with his invention has caused some marital issues with his wife, Diane (Marcia Strassman).  His daughter Amy (Amy O’Neill) is a normal teenage girl, but his son, Nick (Robert Oliveri) is more like his father and desperately seeks his dad’s approval.  While Wayne is at a conference Amy and Nick, along with the neighbor’s kids, Russ (Thomas Wilson) and Ron (Jared Rushton) accidentally get shrunk and end up in the backyard which is like a hostile jungle while in their shrunken state.  The four kids must learn how to work together and to trust each other in order to survive the trek through the backyard and back to the house where they can hopefully be brought back to normal size.  Along the way they fight bees and a scorpion, nearly drown when the sprinkler system is accidentally turned on and come close to being chopped to bits by a lawn mower.    Russ and Amy begin to fall in love while Ron and Nick find they have more in common than they thought.

Honey, I Shrunk the Kids is a 1989 American science-fiction comedy and the first a franchise which includes two additional movies and a television series.  The film was released on June 23, 1989, and was an unexpected box office success.  Costing $18 million to make, the movie grossed $222.7 million worldwide.  It became the highest-grossing live action Disney movie of all time and held that title for five years.  It was also the seventh highest grossing film of that year.  It was the directorial debut for Joe Johnston who was a visual effects artist, most notably on the original Star Wars films being the creative designer behind the Millennium Falcon and co-creating the design for Boba Fett.  His association with George Lucas would pay off when he won an Academy Award for Visual Effects for Raider’s of the Lost Ark.  Joe has gone on to direct some successes and some failures.  After Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, he directed the comic-book adaptation of The Rocketeer, which was a commercial failure, but he would go on to direct Jumanji, Jurassic Park III, and the remake of the 1941 classic film, The Wolfman.  Partially due to his direction on The Rocketeer, he was tapped to direct Captain America: The First Avenger.  In 2019, he entered negotiations with Disney to direct Shrunk, a sequel to Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, but just recently, Disney decided to move away from that project.  This would have been the first live-action role for Rick Moranis, who stepped away from acting in 1997 to care for his two kids after his wife died of cancer.

I had just completed my freshman year of college when this film came out and I remember seeing it in the theater, and I remember liking it.  Rewatching it now, I much more appreciate the work that went into this film, especially in 1989.  The film, for the most part is visually stunning and knowing Joe’s background in special effects, it makes perfect sense.  There are a couple super imposed images that don’t look quite as real as what we see with the advanced computer-generated images that today’s audiences are used to, but they are still super impressive.  The practical effects are all very impressive as well.  The grass in the backyard, for example, looks extremely real.  Adding to the look of the film, the soundtrack by the late, great, James Horner is amazing.  Building the music off of Raymon Scott’s piece “Powerhouse B” which was often used during chase scenes in Warner Brothers Cartoons, gave the film a whimsical yet dynamic feel and accentuated each scene causing the appropriate emotional response from the audience. Technical aspects aside, the storyline is your typical Disney fair and is predictable, but that works well for this film.  It has some great comical moments along with some exciting adventure and some emotional scenes.  The film moves at a good speed and has a nice yet fast paced rhythm.  The performances are also typical of a Disney Live-Action film.  The kids all do a decent job establishing their characters and going on an emotional journey revealing private things about their inner feelings.  I am not a huge fan of Matt Frewer, who plays the Szalinski’s next door neighbor, but was pleasantly surprised by a toned-down performance as compared to his other roles.  The real highlight acting wise is Rick Moranis.  If there is any actor who can portray meek, intelligent yet caring characters, it is Rick, with a natural ability that allows the audience to connect with him in ways that other actors struggle with.  Overall, this is a fun, whimsical film and if you are looking to escape the reality of the world for a tidbit of time, it’s a great movie to escape into.