Abstract
Suburban Fantastic is one of the most influential subgenres of 1980s American cinema. Its classics include the children’s adventures from Amblin (producer of Steven Spielberg) such as Poltergeist, E.T., Gremlins, Back to the Future and The Goonies. Angus McFadzean has recently categorised the subgenre after the return of its popularity in the 2010s in works such as Super 8 and Stranger Things, which have been published as “nostalgic 1980s science fiction” and “Amblin-style works”. In search of a better consolidation of what suburban fantastic is, this article shows how part of its development appears to be a replication of the E.T. and Poltergeist model of adapting blockbusters and works from other cinematic genres into narratives centred on children, teenagers and young adults. This examination highlights how the subgenre was an important part of the “Reaganite Entertainment” period, adapting the blockbuster model to the audience with the greatest consumption potential in American cinema: suburban youth. Finally, the article explores the implications of the Suburban Fantastic for other genres in the film industry from the 1980s onwards.
Keywords: Suburban Fantastic; Genre; Adventure; American Cinema; 1980s
Introduction
Suburban Fantastic is a cinematic subgenre that was first categorized by Angus McFadzean in a 2017 article and later in the 2019 book The Suburban Fantastic Cinema. According to him
is a name used to designate a set of Hollywood films that began to appear in the 1980s, where children and teenagers living in the suburbs are called upon to confront a fantastic and disruptive force – ghosts, aliens, vampires, gremlins and evil robots (…) have become synonymous with the work of directors such as Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante, Robert Zemeckis and Chris Columbus. Commonly referred to as children’s films or “family” films, they were a key part of the childhood of the late generation X (1965-1980) and the entire millennial generation (1981-1996). (McFadzean, 2019, p.1) (Author’s translation)[i][1]
The subgenre began in 1982 with the release of two films by Amblin Entertainment, Steven Spielberg’s production company: Poltergeist (Toby Hopper, 1982) and E.T. – The Extraterrestrial (Steven Spielberg, 1982). The box-office success of both (Poltergeist was one of the top ten box-office hits of the year, and E.T. was the biggest box-office hit in the history of cinema) led Amblin to start releasing children’s productions that followed a similar structure, in which young people had their coming-of-age narratives while having to restore the status quo of a suburb/small town destabilized by a fantastic event. This was the case with films like Gremlins (Joe Dante, 1984), The Goonies (Richard Donner, 1985), the Back to the Future trilogy (Richard Zemeckis, 1985, 1989, 1990) and Casper (Brad Silberling, 1995)
The success of these works led to the release of narratives with the same “tone” by other studios. This was the case, for example, with Disney’s Flight of the Navigator (Randal Kleiser, 1986), Honey, I Srunk the Kids (Joe Johnston, 1989) and Hocus Pocus (Hocus Poucus, Kenny Ortega, 1993), Fox‘s Home Alone and its sequels (Home Alone and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, Chris Columbus, 1990 and 1992) and from Tristar with Short Circuit (John Badham, 1986) and Jumanji (Joe Johnston, 1995).
The focus of this article is to discuss how, in addition to a quest to repeat the success of other works from the 1980s, Suburban Fantastic has consolidated itself as a format for Hollywood to make children’s and young people’s adaptations of big hits, as McFadzean states when he says that Suburban Fantastic “dramatizes the relationship between the public and Hollywoood’s generic products. Indicated by the correspondence between the choice of the fantastic after the box office dominance of certain blockbusters” (2019, p.49). It is worth pointing out that evidence for this correlation can be found right from the origin of the subgenre, since both Poltergeist and E.T. – The Extraterrestrial are the fruit of a project called Night Skies, a kind of thematic sequel to the highly successful science fiction[2] Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Steven Spielberg, 1977) . [3]
From this perspective, this article dialogues with the book The Suburban Fantastic Cinema by Angus McFadzean to delve into how Suburban Fantastic is categorized as a cinematic subgenre. An important counterpoint is made to the book, when I consider the importance of defining its generic matrices in the Adventure genre[4] (and not in Fantasy) and how this makes it easier to explain the model of Suburban Fantastic in the production of children’s and young people’s adaptations of narratives from the most diverse (sub)genres[5] . Finally, I also point out how the very success of Suburban Fantastic has affected works from other (sub)genres that have started to incorporate young protagonists, broadening their market potential by encompassing a younger demographic, as is the case with the science fiction Terminator 2:, James Cameron, 1991) and Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg, 1993), the action film Last Action Hero (Jack McTiernan, 1993), as well as producing hybrids such as the slasher Child’s Play (Tom Holland, 1988).
Suburban Fantastic as a subgenre
Before discussing the implications of Suburban Fantastic as a subgenre, it is important to be clear about the multiple definitions of what a cinematic (sub)genre can be. According to the canonical definitions of Rick Altman (2000, p.14), it can be seen as:
1) Scheme or Formula: to be followed from the conception of the project by the producer as a way of “minimizing their risks” (e.g. “making a superhero movie to try to get a big box office”) and also communicating with screenwriters, directors, photographers, editors, about the characteristics and genre tropes of the film they want to produce
2) As a category of communication or label: used by distributors and exhibitors to sell and inform about the film (e.g. “announce at the door of the cinema that a new Jennifer Aniston romance film is coming out”). Altman even mentions how these labels can serve to alienate rather than attract audiences (e.g. “the person who hates horror movies”) (2000, p.110).
3) As a contract of reception and horizon of expectation for the audience: thus, when the viewer is informed that the movie is a comedy, he already creates certain expectations about the work, such as that he will laugh and have fun
4) As a structure: in other words, syntactic, semantic, aesthetic and narrative characteristics that allow us to understand that film as part of a corpus of filmic texts with similar characteristics, or even to discuss its similarities/differences with other films in that corpus (e.g. “analyzing Star Wars (George Lucas, 1977) as a western”).
It’s important to note that when Angus McFadzean categorized Suburban Fantastic for the first time, he obviously started from a structural question. More specifically, the researcher used the semantic/syntactic theory proposed by Altman himself in Film/Genre (2000) to select the elements that unite these different films produced from the 1980s onwards. According to McFadzean (2019, p.16), semantically, Suburban Fantastic mixes the material elements of suburban culture with elements of Fantasy, Adventure, Action, Science Fiction and/or Horror. Syntactically, the subgenre tells the story of the maturation of a young protagonist synchronized with the resolution of the consequences caused by the entry of fantastic elements into his environment, appealing to his heroic character. In other words, it tells the story of suburban children, teenagers and young adults who mature while dealing with the problems caused by fantastic elements (be they little green monsters, time travel or bumbling muggers). However, this classification was only made by McFadzean at the end of the 2010s – more than 30 years after the release of E.T. and Poltergeist. So how could it be seen as a Hollywood formula or a category of communication for distributors and exhibitors in the 1980s?
First of all, it’s important to clarify that the definition of Suburban Fantastic was not the insight of a single person. McFadzean’s work came from giving a name and theoretical definition to a perception that was already evident to the industry, distributors and the audience. A very didactic example was the production and marketing of the series Stranger Things (Duffer Brothers, 2016), Netflix’s biggest hit to date, which was thought of and received as a kind of “Amblin-style” work[6][7] . A definition that is obviously rather vague. After all, what is this “Amblin style”? It’s certainly not a style that is present in all of the company’s films, and even less something that is restricted to its catalog. After all, it would be absurd to say that Cape Fear (Martin Scorsese, 1991), a work by the production company, has much more of this “Amblin style” than Monster Squad (Fred Dekker, 1987). Another definition, equally vague, is the one that has been consolidated in the RPG system called “Kids on Bikes”[8] . Both the “Amblin-style” films and the “Kids on Bikes” references form precisely the corpus of films that McFadzean would categorize under the subgenre of suburban fantastic or Suburban Fantastic.
But would it be correct to say that Suburban Fantastic only came to be understood by researchers, audiences, distributors and studios as a subgenre in the 2010s? The short answer is no. Although the time gap of more than three decades allows us to understand how the subgenre developed, including its peak and decline, it was already quite clear during the 1980s that Hollywood studios were looking to reproduce the E.T. formula to try to guarantee similar audiences. Very crude (and therefore didactic) examples were the production of films such as Mac – the Alien (Mac and Me, Stewart Raffill, 1988) and the South African Nukie (Sias Odendal and Michael Pakleppa, 1987), which made their inspirations obvious from the promotional material (figure 1). In other cases, films such as the Australian Frog Dreaming (Brian Trenchard-Smith, 1986) communicate on their posters that the actor chosen to play the protagonist was not chosen for nothing (figure 2). Steve Neale (1990) stresses the importance of analyzing these advertising materials in order to understand how (sub)genres are established based on what he calls intertextual relay – since they require a contract between the producer/distributor and the audience in order to establish a communication about what the film is about (hence, its generic characteristics).
[1] In the original: “‘Suburban fantastic cinema’ is a name that designates a set of Hollywood movies that started to appear in the 1980s, in which pre-teen and teenage boys living within the suburbs are called upon to confront a disruptive fantastic force – ghosts, aliens, vampires, gremlins and malevolent robots. (…) became synonymous with the work of Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante, Robert Zemeckis and Chris Columbus.Typicalliy marked as children’s films or “family ” films, they were key parts of the childhood of late-Generation Xer’s and Millenials.”
[2] To create a distinction for the reader, in this article, genres are capitalized and sub-genres are lower case.
[3] Available at: https://filmschoolrejects.com/spielberg-night-skies/ Accessed on 03/01/2024
[4] There is an ever-present debate about the need to refer to “subgenres” and not just “genres”. For the purpose of this article, the categorical division is important, since it discusses issues of matrix/original gender.
[5] From now on, the term (sub)gender will be used in this article to refer to both gender and subgenre.
[6] Available at: https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/stranger-things-duffer-brothers-share-secrets-hit-show/ Accessed on 03/01/2024
[7] Available at: https://www.cbr.com/netflixs-stranger-things-trailer-promises-amblin-style-scares-wonder/ Accessed on 03/01/2024
[8] Available at: https://www.huntersentertainment.com/kidsonbikesrpg
Figure 2: Two posters for Frog Dreamings (which was distributed in the United States under the name The Quest). The first one says “You loved him in E.T.. Now Henry Thomas is back as Cody Walpole”. The second says “Henry Thomas, the star of E.T., invites you on a journey beyond your imagination”. Source: imdb.com and filmaffinity.com
However, this communication is not always so simple. A case in point is Gremlins (Joe Dante, 1984) – the Amblin film whose controversies ended up creating the PG-13 age rating[1] . The script, signed by a young Chris Columbus, was originally for an R-rated movie[2] . However, Steven Spielberg, who was in charge of the production, suggested that the film should be more fun and “family-friendly” along the lines of E.T.. The film’s violence was toned down and it was given a PG rating[3] (the same as E.T.), which allowed it to reach the third highest domestic box office of the year. However, frightening features and bizarre scenes (such as the one in which a gremlin is crushed in a blender) remained in the film, which was sold as a Christmas movie, as well as making use of the idea that its tone would be similar to that of E.T.. This led TV Guide magazine to accuse the film of “cynically aiming to attract an audience of young children who will undoubtedly be terrified by this myth-busting movie”. Following the controversy, Spielberg himself, together with Jack Valenti, president of the MPAA (Motion Picture Association), suggested the creation of the PG-13 intermediate label[4] . Curiously, Red Dawn (John Milus, 1984), another work of Suburban Fantastic, was the first film to receive this label.
Beyond a curious anecdote, the case of Gremlins points to a complicating factor in the question of delimiting a (sub)genre. After all, as much as they are Amblin works and have the “Amblin style”, and fit McFadzean’s semantic/syntactic definitions, how can we categorize films like E.T., Gremlins, Back to the Future and The Goonies as belonging to the same subgenre: a coming-of-age/coming-of-age fantasy, an invasion horror, a time-travel sci-fi and an exploration adventure? This is the central point of this article. This is because the fact that Suburban Fantastic encompasses works that relate to multiple (sub)genres is precisely due to its consolidation based on a model of adapting diverse narratives for a children’s and/or teenage audience and based on the success of E.T. and Poltergeist. In other words, they are a corpus of films that, formed by works with profound “distinctive traits” (Altman, 2000, p.14) that differentiate them, are still based on an easily recognizable and referential structure (the “Amblin style”).
These “distinguishing features” between some films, however, help us understand why these works have never been categorized as part of the same subgenre before. Stranger Things, for example, has been cataloged on Netflix as “a Science Fiction that pays tribute to the Sci-Fi and Horror classics of the 1980s[5] “. McFadzean responds to this phenomenon by pointing out that Suburban Fantastic has become diluted in broader generic definitions such as “children’s movies” or “family movies” (2019, p.1). However, as pointed out in the case of Gremlins, such generalizations end up creating false perspectives on Suburban Fantastic itself, since they associate it with typical characteristics of its film of origin, E.T., disregarding the changes that the subgenre has undergone over the decade. This is the case with Lost Boys (Joel Schumacher, 1987), a classic of Suburban Fantastic, and a more “daring” work, with a certain sexual content and which was given an R rating. In other words, a film that can hardly be considered a “family” or “children’s” movie.
Adventure as the generic matrix of Suburban Fantastic
I believe that an important part of the work of establishing solid relationships between the films of Suburban Fantastic (overcoming their “distinctive features”) comes from pinpointing their generic matrix. In other words, understanding the genre from which Suburban Fantastic originates. There is little doubt, for example, that slasher and zombie films are a variation on Horror cinema, and that heist movies and brucutu films[6] have their roots in the Action genre. However, such definitions are not always so clear-cut. After all, there is no hierarchical rule that forces a subgenre to fit into just one “generic affiliation”. Romantic comedy, for example, comes from a hybridization between Romance and Comedy, with both as generic matrices. In addition, there is the case of subgenres that arise within a genre, such as found footage[7] in Horror cinema, but which can have films that fit into another genre – as in the case of the superhero film Chronicle (Josh Trank, 2012).
These considerations demonstrate some of the conceptual complications that discussions about (sub)genres can provide. Not surprisingly, Altman warns that throughout the history of cinema, most critics have preferred to deal with works that are clearly linked to a specific genre, avoiding anomalies and “generic crossovers” (2000, p.17). This search for “generic purity”, however, is fruitless in a subgenre marked by hybridity and relationships with other (sub)genres, as is the case with Suburban Fantastic. Since such conceptual discussions are inescapable (and inexhaustible), I propose to focus specifically on one central issue: the idea that Suburban Fantastic does not have Fantasy as its generic matrix[8] as the name might indicate, but rather the Adventure genre. This perspective runs counter to a common perception that can be made from Angus McFadzean’s point that Suburban Fantastic historically originated in child-centered fantasy films and in the science fiction, horror and fantasy tropes of television and cinema (2019, p.2). In other words, the idea that Suburban Fantastic originates from Fantasy narratives[9] and – therefore – its semantic elements are inherently constituent parts of it. Angus McFadzean goes on to say, in this sense, that Suburban Fantastic is an overlap between the syntactic-semantic elements of melodramas set in the suburbs, with the syntactic-semantic language of the fantastic[10] (2019, p.15).
Farah Mendlesohn, a reference in fantasy studies, categorizes fantasy in four ways, based on how the elements appear in the narrative. These are: 1) Portal/Journey Fantasy: works that involve crossing from a “normal place” to a fantastic place; 2) Immersive Fantasy: works where the whole world is fantastic; 3) Liminal Fantasy: These would be works where both the protagonist and the spectator, have difficulty understanding, perceiving or accepting the fantasy; 4) Intrusive Fantasy: works where the fantastic appears to take away the stability of the protagonist, without taking him out of his place, assuming that normality is organized and, with the entry of the fantasy of the world, it becomes disorganized. When fantasy recedes from the world, it returns to its predictability (2008, p.XXII).
Within Mendlesohn’s conception, it is quite clear that Suburban Fantastic would fit into this fourth conception of Fantasy, which also includes films from other subgenres such as Mary Poppins (Robert Stevenson, 1964) and The Lake House (Alejandro Agresti, 2006). The question that arises, however, is that this idea of the need for the fantastic element brings a series of complications to McFadzean’s categorization of Suburban Fantastic, since even among the works categorized in his book, some do not bring fantastic elements to the narrative. This is the case, for example, with Stand by Me (Rob Reiner, 1986) and (The Sandlot) David Mickey Evans, 1993) to which the researcher attributes a “naturalized perspective of the fantastic”[11] (2019, p.99). The resolution of both films abandons any fantastic explanation – which makes McFadzean claim that they are “liminal” works (2019, p.100) within the subgenre. The researcher himself also recalls that Suburban Fantastic went through a series of experiments during the 1980s – with films that not only made the “fantastic” more subjective, but also gave up the fantastic elements to add, for example, military dramas such as Red Dawn, Russkies) Rick Rosenthal, 1987) and The Rescue (Ferdinand Fairfax, 1988) (2019, p.40). Other “exceptions” also included in his book are even more “liminal” works, such as the martial arts drama Karate Kid (John Avildsen, 1984) and the action comedy Home Alone (Chris Columbus, 1990). In addition, McFadzean doesn’t mention a series of similar films that appeared in the period, such as 3 Ninjas (Jon Turteltaub, 1992), Sidekicks (Aaron Norris, 1992), Dennis the Menace (Nick Castle, 1993) and Richie Rich (Donald Petrie, 1994) – probably because they were derivations of these “threshold” films.
This “liminality”, however, falls apart if we let go of the need for the fantastic element and focus on another common feature of these works: they can all be understood as adventures. Adventure is a broad generic category with wide-ranging definitions, which is usually mixed with works of Action, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Comedy, War, etc. According to Thomas Sobchack (in Tasker, 2004, p.91), the Adventure genre can be defined as an offshoot of medieval romance in which the “protagonist has or needs to develop special skills to overcome great human, natural or supernatural obstacles in extraordinary situations in order to restore order to the world” (2004, p.91). This generic perspective, in turn, underlines the main syntactic element of Suburban Fantastic: the resolution of extraordinary problems in order to restore the status quo through physical action. In addition, it deconditions the need for fantastic elements, and broadens this perspective to what is “out of the ordinary” (hence fantastic in the eyes of a child/young person): be it aliens, gremlins, vampires and robots, but also muggers, greedy businessmen, orca hunters and karate masters
This broader view (detached from the need for semantic elements of Fantasy, Horror, Science Fiction) of Suburban Fantastic even favors McFadzean’s assertion that:
Although many [of the films cited in his book] go beyond the suburban setting, science fiction, horror and fantasy genres, male melodrama and the tonal mix of the Amblin cycle, they generally maintain the distinct connection between the personal dilemmas of the pre-adolescent protagonist and the element of the fantastic. Therefore, in my opinion, films in which this remains the dominant element in their generic mix can be called “works of Suburban Fantastic”, although careful analysis is required to determine the relationship of each film to this semantic/syntactic model (McFadzean, 2019, p.41)
Thus, based on this proposed generic matrix, Suburban Fantastic comes to be understood as narratives of maturation in which a young person (or group of young people) needs to restore the status quo of their surroundings after it has been disrupted by non-ordinary elements, with a focus on physical action. This makes it possible to fit works like Fly Away Home[13] (Carroll Ballard, 1996) (figure 3)[14] , where a girl builds an airplane to help geese in their migratory flow, into Suburban Fantastic, while leaving out other coming-of-age films like The Blue Lagoon, Randal Kleiser, 1980), which tells the story of the romance between two young people lost on a desert island, and Seaching for Bobby Fischer (Steve Zaillian, 1993), which tells of a boy’s journey to become a chess champion.
[1] Parental Guidance Strongly Cautioned – Age rating that says that some parts of the movie may be inappropriate for children under 13.
[2] Restricted, i.e. films that require young people under the age of 17 to be accompanied by an adult.
[3] Parental Guidance Suggested. Film suitable for all ages.
[4] Available at: https://www.indiewire.com/features/general/30-years-of-gremlins-how-steven-spielberg-ushered-in-the-era-of-pg-13-blockbuster-entertainment-85120/ Accessed on 08/01/2024.
[5] Available at: https://www.netflix.com/br/title/80057281 Accessed on 05/01/2024.
[6] Also known as “One Man Army”. Films where a lone hero is enough to violently confront groups and groups of opponents. Works such as Rambo 2: The Mission (Rambo: First Blood Part 2, George Cosmatos, 1985) and John Wick: Back in the Game (John Wick, Chad Stahelski, 2015).
[7] Works that emulate found film material, lending it a documentary nature
[8] Instead of Fantasy, we can think of a broader classification such as “Unusual” (in the sense of combinations of Fantasy, Science Fiction and Horror) as this generic base, where fantasy would still be the main generic base among these three.
[9] See previous footnote.
[10] It’s important to point out, before delving into this pondering, that in addition to Fantasy, Science Fiction and Horror, McFadzean also mentions the semantic and syntactic elements coming from Action and Adventure films as a possible part of this “fantastic”, providing a theoretical opening for the points being raised here.
[11] The films work respectively with the mysteries that probe the search for a boy’s body in the middle of the forest and the identity of a neighbor who lives beyond a high wall
[13] The film is also not mentioned in the book The Suburban Fantastic Cinema by Angus McFadzean (2019).
[14] Not coincidentally, the Flying Home poster itself mentions the E.T. poster, demonstrating an attempt to link the two works.
Figure 3: Flying Home poster. Source: imdb.com
Suburban Fantastic as a Marketing Tool
In order to properly discuss the proposal that Suburban Fantastic served as a kind of “marketing tool” for Hollywood, it is first necessary to situate the subgenre in the historical context of the Reagan years[1] and the so-called “Reaganist Entertainment”. This was the name given to a cultural and marketing environment that reached its peak in the 1980s, marked by an industrial system based on the production of “escapist entertainment” that anesthetized the viewer with special effects, crazy stories and self-referentiality. Walters (2011) focuses on this concept by saying that the films of this period generated a state of perpetual anxiety caused by the dichotomy between the immediate pleasure of escaping reality when watching the work, and the immediate feeling that it was “just a movie” at the end (i.e. not requiring deeper/critical reflections at the end of the work). “A product as wonderful as it is insignificant” (Britton, 2009, p.101).
According to Britton, this is a general term to designate a set of repetitive works, celebratory of an American lifestyle, and self-referential in an “endless solipsism” (in the sense of being a repetition of uniquely American experiences) (2009, p.99). Thus, these productions were thought of within a context of “constant consumption”, where watching the movie was just the beginning. During this period, major Hollywood studios began to think of their films as brands (or franchises) to be reproduced either through countless sequels, TV cartoons, videogames, soundtrack sales, memorabilia… This is the case with franchises such as Superman, Rocky, Rambo, Indiana Jones, Terminator, Die Hard, Star Wars, Jaws, Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th and Ghostbusters.
It is within this context that Suburban Fantastic originates and stands out by bringing to the center of the plot a demographic that, at the same time as being underrepresented in American cinema, represented enormous financial potential: the young middle-class inhabitant of the American suburbs[2] . If we look at the blockbuster films in the United States since Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975) inaugurated the concept of blockbusters, we can see that none of them brings children to the center of the plot: Rocky (Sylvester Stallone, 1976), Star Wars IV (George Lucas, 1977), Grease (Randal Kleiser, 1978), Superman (Richard Donner, 1979), Star Wars V (Irvin Kershner, 1980) and Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark (Steven Spielberg, 1981). It wasn’t until 1982 that E.T. hit the 322 million dollar mark, becoming the biggest box office in history and creating a huge stir in the industry. McFadzean explains that E.T. began to speak directly to an entire suburban middle class whose children could finally go to the movies to watch works that referred to their subjectivity and sensibility (2019, p.26). Representing what would become Suburban Fantastic, he demonstrated that the subgenre could be the way in which Hollywood could speak more directly to its key audience: suburban middle-class families and, more specifically, their children (p.49)
Paulo Emilio Gomes emphasizes the importance of this young demographic for the film industry:
For as long as the cinema has existed as a stabilized popular entertainment, research has been carried out in the United States and in the main European countries with results that always agree: more or less from the age of twelve, individuals go to the cinema, increasing their attendance rapidly until it reaches its highest point between the ages of 15 and 20, and then gradually declining. (GOMES, 1981, apud DE PAULA, 2005, p .25)
With the consumption habits of this audience in mind, the producers of E.T. saw the possibility of stamping the alien on all kinds of youth products such as board games, video games, McDonald’s snacks, action figures… Even the movie itself was featured on various products, ranging from Star Wars action figures to sweets (Sirota, 2011). In this sense, it is worth remembering that the “ordinariness” of suburban culture allows its semantic elements to be mixed with products to be sold, which was sometimes not possible in works from other genres (after all, how could you include a reference to Reese’s Piece’s candy in Indiana Jones or Star Wars?)
The impact of E.T., however, was not only on the aforementioned films that tried to emulate its alien narrative[3] . More than just showing how receptive the public was to “movies with aliens”, its success demonstrated that adapting narratives for children was a very profitable business for the studios. This became clear when important works of Suburban Fantastic were inspired by Hollywood blockbusters. McFadzean cites, for example, how Poltergeist responds to the childish themes of The Omen (Richard Donner, 1976), Home Alone[4] can be read as a kind of children’s version of Die Hard (John McTiernan, 1988); and Jumanji (Joe Johnston, 1995) as a film that brought the visual effects success of Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg, 1993), while its thematic sequel Zathura (Jon Favreau, 2005) talked to Armageddon (Michael Bay, 1998) (2019, p.50). Other examples are War Games (John Badham, 1983) and Violent Dawn, youth versions of the Cold War thrillers common in the 1980s; Cloak & Dagger (Richard Franklin, 1984), an allusion to the 007 spy franchise; The Last Starfighter (Nick Castle, 1984), a clear reference to works from the Wars and Star Trek franchises; The Goonies, a youth adventure along the lines of Raiders of the Lost Ark (Steven Spielberg, 1981)[5] ; Karate Kid and Sidekicks, sports/competition and martial arts films, genres in vogue at the time; and, of course, Back to the Future 3 as a western perspective on the subgenre.
In this sense, it is particularly interesting to pay attention to the relationship that Suburban Fantastic will have specifically with Horror cinema. As Richard Nowell explains, when talking about the genre (and, more directly, the slasher subgenre), Regan’s election represented a conservative turn in the MPAA towards sex and violence (2010, p.229). This shift resulted in stricter ratings for films with nudity and gore, and meant that Hollywood had to adapt. Nowell explains that from 1981 onwards the “incentives to produce and distribute slasher films diminished considerably, and in their place a series of more commercially attractive Horror films aimed at young people emerged” (2010, p.241). After all, since it wasn’t possible to produce films with sex and excessive blood without receiving a harsher age rating, another possibility became the production of horror works that appealed to broader demographics.
Two Amblin works are exemplary in this sense: Poltergeist, which relied on the successful efforts Spielberg and Toby Hopper[6] to change the rating from R to PG[7] , which allowed the film to reach the seventh highest domestic box office of the year, and the aforementioned Gremlins, also shared the PG rating. Toby Hopper still managed to get a PG rating for Invaders from Mars (1986) – a remake of the 1953 film, but from the perspective of a child. However, it was the exception: the campy and innocent The Monster Squad (received a PG-13 rating, which basically ended its chances of reaching the demographic for which it was produced[8] . By way of comparison, this was the same rating received by Once Bitten (Howard Storm, 1985), a vampire movie with a narrative about losing one’s virginity.
With the more widespread use of PG-13 for works centered on children with Horror tropes, such as Critters (Stephen Herick, 1986), The Gate (Tibor Takacs, 1987), It (Tommy Lee Wallace, 1990) and the rest of the Poltergeist trilogy, another parallel movement in the industry is also becoming apparent. Smaller studios, in general, began to present fantastic suburban narratives focused on older protagonists, seeking to reach teenage audiences (McFadzean, 2019, p.31). This is the case with films such as Fright Night (Tom Holland, 1985), Deadly Friend (Wes Craven, 1986), Watchers (Jon Hess, 1988), Arcade (Albert Pyun, 1993), Brainscan (John Flynn, 1994) and Evolver (Mark Rosman, 1995). The works aimed at a new audience, of course, didn’t end – but they largely migrated to television. Thus, at the turn of the 1980s to the 1990s, there was a profusion of subgenre series. Among the most famous are Tales from Crypt (William Gaines, HBO, 1989-1996), Are You Afraid of the Dark? (D.J. MacHale and Ned Kandel, Nicklodeon, 1990-1996), Eeirie, Indiana (José Rivera and Karl Schaefer, NBC, 1991-1993) and Goosebumps (Deborah Forte, Fox Kids, 1995-1998) .
The Influence of Suburban Fantastic on other (sub)genres
As we have seen, Suburban Fantastic has established itself as a cinematic subgenre through which the Hollywood industry can adapt narratives from blockbusters and other (sub)genres, seeking to bring young protagonists to the center of the plot with whom younger demographics can identify. Another issue that should be noted, however, is the influence that Suburban Fantastic will have on other (sub)genres. One of the main ways in which we can witness this phenomenon is from the profusion of works that have imported the figure of the “wronged boy”, the archetypal protagonist of Suburban Fantastic, into their narratives. McFadzean explains
The simplest way to introduce some of the semantic and syntactic material of Suburban Fantastic into modern blockbusters, however, is to introduce pre-teen protagonists who are important companions to the main heroes. This leads to films in which a boy is hunted by robots from the future who think he is the future savior of mankind (Terminator 2: Judgment Day); in which a disgruntled, movie-obsessed boy is transported to the latest action movie with his screen hero (The Last Action Hero); and in which a brother and sister visit a dinosaur park that breaks down and releases the dinosaurs (Jurassic Park) (….) children function, in part, as a substitute for this target demographic, since, despite the age rating, these blockbusters are often marketed to children as well and have accompanying toy lines. (McFadzean, 2019, p.48-49))[9]
It’s worth noting that, as Altman explains, just a single syntactic or semantic element (such as the presence of a young protagonist, linked to a trope typical of Suburban Fantastic) is enough to revive the audience’s feelings for the subgenre (2000, p.132). Thus, it is remarkable that Jurassic Park, an Amblin classic directed by Spielberg himself, and the first film to break E.T.’s box office record, carries that typical feeling of Suburban Fantastic.
Another interesting case of this “wronged boy” figure is the Child’s Play franchise[10] , which innovates as a slasher by centering its narrative on a child, creating a kind of hybrid between the two subgenres. It’s no coincidence that the doll Chucky, the villain of the franchise, has become a pop culture icon and has won several toy lines. The influence of Suburban Fantastic continued into the 21st century, even during the subgenre’s decline, and can be seen in blockbusters such as Transformers (Michael Bay, 2007), Iron Man 3 (Shane Black, 2013), Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (Shawn Levy, 2013), Midnight Special (Jeff Nichols, 2015) and M3gan (Gerard Johnstone, 2023)
Finally, another influence that cannot go unnoticed is the influence of Suburban Fantastic on the consolidation of other subgenres. Works that come to have specific syntactic and semantic characteristics, but which still fit into Suburban Fantastic, since they reproduce the narrative structure of works such as E.T., Short Circuit – The Incredible Robot and Harry and the Hendersons. In this sense, two subgenres stand out. The first is animal films, which became popular in the 1990s, such as Beethoven (Brian Levant, 1992), Free Willy (Simon Wincer, 1993), Andre (George T. Miller, 1994), Monkey Trouble (Franco Amurri, 1994) and Bud (Kevin DiCicco, 1997). These are coming-of-age narratives in which children and teenagers make friends with “special” animals (such as a thieving monkey and a basketball-playing golden retriever), while having to deal with unsavory thieves and petty businessmen.
The other subgenre, which is more recent, has gained popularity as 3D effects have become more popular. These are what I call “animated partner” films. These are usually nostalgic works from previous decades where a teenager/young adult meets a classic animated character and, based on this friendship, has to solve big problems – experiencing a whole arc of emotional maturation in the process. Examples include Yogi Bear (Eric Brevig, 2010), The Smurfs (Raja Gosnell, 2011), Woody Woodpecker (Alex Zamm, 2017), Pokemon: Detective Pikachu (Rob Letterman, 2019) and Sonic (Jeff Fowler, 2020).
Considerations
The purpose of this article is to demonstrate that Suburban Fantastic, in addition to being a cinematic subgenre that marked the 1980s, also functioned as a formula/method for some Hollywood studios to reach a potential audience: middle-class children and young people. This perspective, in turn, brings greater complexity to (sub)genre studies by offering a subgenre whose origin goes beyond the “mass production” of similar films (Langford, p.26, 2005), as was the case with the slasher in the same period.
It’s also interesting to think about how one of the main characteristics of Suburban Fantastic, which is its pervasion of other (sub)genres, speaks to the “endless solipsism” of the Reaganist entertainment scene, since it comes from the reuse and recycling of pop culture itself (Britton, 2009). In other words, the success of characters like Indiana Jones and 007 and their endless franchises is not enough: it is also possible to make “young” versions of their films, talking more directly to younger audiences and introducing them earlier to the entertainment and consumer market established by Hollywood. At the same time, it’s clear that beyond all the pastiches and cheap attempts to emulate films and franchises, several youth classics were produced in the period that made Suburban Fantastic one of the most influential subgenres of the 1980s.
This cultural influence even returned in the 2010s, with the release of works such as Super 8 (J.J. Abrahms, 2011), Stranger Things, It – Chapter 1 (Andy Muschietti, 2017) and Bumblebee (Travis Knight, 2018) – which helped revive nostalgia for 1980s pop culture and Suburban Fantastic itself. These productions, in turn, proved essential in consolidating the understanding of audiences and the industry of Suburban Fantastic as a subgenre, even if it had not yet been categorized. This perspective also demonstrates how recent the studies of Suburban Fantastic are, so that there is still a lot to think about the subgenre and its impact on American and world cinema.
[1] Ronald Reagan, US president from 1981 to 1989 and considered one of the most influential politicians in the country’s history. A Republican, he was one of the most important figures in neoliberalism. He was known for his charisma (he was an actor) and for his “Make America Great Again” speech, which would be repeated by Donald Trump.
[2] The US suburbs are the most widespread urbanization in the country. Since the 1980s, more people live in the country’s suburbs than in the countryside and metropolises combined.
[3] In fact, it seems that this strategy was doomed to fail, since both Mac – The Alien and Nukie were box office flops and are considered “some of the worst films in history”. Other films that tried to copy his formula were Purple People Eater (Linda Shayne, 1988), Suburban Commando (Brut Kennedy, 1991), Spain’s Los Nuevos Extraterrestre (Juan Piquer Símon, 1983), Argentina’s Los Extraterrestre (Enrique Carreas, 1983), Turkey’s Badi (Zafer Par, 1984) and China’s Pi li bei bei (Song Chong and Luming Wen, 1988).
[4] Which in turn will be the inspiration for Super Remote Control (Remote, Ted Nicolaou, 1993)
[5]As a curiosity: in 2020 a Goonies series was planned based on the true story of a group of young people who tried to film a frame-by-frame remake of The Raiders of the Lost Ark. Available at: https://variety.com/2022/film/news/elvis-box-office-gail-berman-wednesday-the-goonies-1235304331/. Accessed on 04/01/2024.
[6] https://mgm.fandom.com/wiki/Poltergeist Accessed on 08/01/2024
[7] In other words, R requiring the presence of adults to accompany young people under the age of 17. PG, only recommending parental supervision. It is worth noting that, as already mentioned, it was only in 1984 that PG-13 was created, an intermediate classification.
[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monster_Squad Accessed on 07/01/2024.
[9] In the original: The simplest way to introduce some of the semantic and syntactic material of the suburban fantastic into modern blockbusters, however, is to introduce pre-teen protagonists who form important sidekicks to the main heroes. This leads to films in which a young boy is hunted by robots from the future who think he is the future saviour of mankind (Terminator 2: Judgment Day); in which a discontented boy obsessed with cinema is transported into the latest action film with his screen hero (The Last Action Hero); and in which a brother and sister visit a dinosaur park which breaks down and releases the dinosaurs (Jurassic Park). (…) the children function partly as stand-ins for that audience demographic, since, despite adult ratings, blockbusters are often marketed to children as well and have accompanying toy lines. But these films still imply a connection between children’s imaginations and fantastic events, even as they are careful to confirm the objective reality of the fantastic
[10] I’m talking more specifically about the initial trilogy, since the following four films took a different direction. It’s worth noting, however, that the contemporary versions (both the cinema reboot and the TV series) have returned to what can be understood as a hybrid between slasher and Suburban Fantastic.
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