Movie Crush Monday: Little C and Hook

Welcome to another Movie Crush Monday! This weeks film of discussion is a freakin classic. 

Hook (1991)

My choice for this weeks Movie Crush came up as an answer in a game of trivia that CT and I played last week at a local pizza place. It was great fun, and when the question "What 1991 Robin Williams movie shares it's name with a Blues Traveler song?" came up I announced triumphantly to my table "Hook!" And then CT shushed me because she was very paranoid that the table next to us was cheating and we Kleppingers have a problem with being over competitive. It will be easier if you chose to find this trait endearing.

But I've been thinking about this movie all week. This movie was my jam as a kid. I loved this type of high adventure, and unlike some other films that I adored in my childhood (Looking at you Power Rangers the Movie) this one is just as fantastic as an adult. In my mind this movie sits on a shelf right next to Goonies and The Karate Kid with all other movies pushed slightly away so as not to soil their perfection. 

The premise of what would happen after Peter Pan spent enough time in London to grow up and have kids of his own is tricky, because you have to have an actor who not only can play a put together lawyer, but can slowly transform into the oversized boy by the end of the film. The filmmakers were lucky to get Robin Williams on board, because I'm not sure there is another actor on the planet who could have pulled this part off. The same goes to Dustin Hoffman as Hook, who manages to add charm and humor while maintaining a constant level of threat. 

This is my favorite scene, kudos to Bob Hoskins and his Smee perfection.

I'm spoiler-ing something in this paragraph, so if you haven't seen the film skip it. I want to take a second to note that this film was one of the first kids movies I can remember watching where a main character dies on screen. Most people wouldn't want to put something like this in a kids film for fear that children wouldn't be able to handle it, but it really adds a necessary weight to the story. Rufio is one of my favorite characters throughout the film, and his emotional journey from leader of the lost boys to Pan's second in command is one of the best character arcs. In an age where a characters death is so often used to shock or horrify, this one is used to propel the story as well as force us to feel the cost of a war. I still tear up when he's killed in the last battle. And then I cry the same tears I did when I first watched the film. To me, that's the mark of a truly extraordinary story; that more than 20 years and a dozen or so viewings later I still feel the emotions that the story is provoking just a poignantly as I did when I was 5. 

Bangerang,

Little C