noonoonomore I watched it just for River, and god this movie is so cute I wanna die.From the massive cuteness of River's face and glasses, their cute childish mistakes and worries to the aliens which are hilarious. Ethan Hawk and the other kid were really good as well, but River, man, he's amazing.It's a shame it didn't get the attention it deserve at the time, and I'm glad people are recognizing its brilliance now.

Brian McAleer Three friends, who love anything to do with aliens, UFO's and space, watch late night movies like "The War of the Worlds" and fall asleep with the TV on. In their dreams, they imagine themselves flying through a cloudy night sky. In one such dream, an idea comes to one of the boys, Ben (Ethan Hawke), which he cannot understand or decipher in his dream. As he awakes with a fright, knowing that he's dreamt something significant, he races over to his table, grabbing paper and pen, and draws down the image he dreamt, trying desperately to capture what he just envisioned in his sleep. After drawing an unusual image as best as he can, Ben grabs his walkie talkie and calls his mate Wolfgang (River Phoenix) who lives on the other side of the neighbourhood. Waking him up in the middle of the night to ramble off his idea, Ben tells Wolfgang he drew as much as he could remember and asks him to take a look at it the next day at school. The next day at school, before Ben can talk about his visionary dream to Wolfgang, he is the target of bullies, and they are punks of the most delinquent sort. Outcast kid Darren (Jason Presson) steps in to break up the scrimmage, and leads the bullies away on a chase. Ben catches up to Darren to thank him, and the two get to know one another, walking through the woods, pushing their bikes along and sharing stories about their dysfunctional parents. As Wolfgang didn't show up to school that day, Ben invites Darren over to meet the junior professor.The particular scientific discovery which kicks things into action in the film, is directing a force of energy to any location, anywhere, simply by entering its co-ordinates. As Ben and Darren arrive at Wolfgang's house after school, he shows them this amazing breakthrough, and here the other two boys decide they want to be a part of it. Ben claims the idea was his, given he described the image from his dream to Wolfgang who used it to make the discovery (and miss a day of school in the process), whereas Darren will go on to show he is the hands-on kid who can build things, like a mechanic or engineer. Ben is the dreamer, Wolfgang is the thinker and Darren is the doer. Together, this trio of explorers will each play an important part in the creation and take- off of a very special project. Wolfgang's latest experiment has more power than he could have calculated himself, so gradually the three boys try to control the energy source, through a series of experiments. Accidentally, they discover the energy source acts like a sphere which can also be used as a travelling device. Wolfgang gets enveloped into it and whizzed around at high speed. Darren suggests devising a way to sit inside it, so the boys can travel around, anywhere, anytime and do, anything. Off they go to the local junkyard, sneaking in to gather up some scrap parts and begin to build…. something. What they will build they don't know yet, but it will take them places they never imagined they could go. Maybe even into Outer Space…Our three Explorers succeed in their crazy idea and manage to build a space ship, scraped together with a large, red chair from an old amusement ride, a garbage can and a NASA sticker as the icing on the cake. Installing their computer inside, the boys do the unthinkable – use their self-made craft to harness the power of the energy sphere, and take off! Up and away they go, rising above their local neighbourhood, soaring above hundreds of houses and spooked dogs that bark up at them from below. They fly across their town at high speed, and quickly learn how to control its accelerated path of flight. But the further and longer they fly around, the more their adventure gets out of control. Back on the ground, and with a taste for adventure in the air, the boys think what the next best step should be. Ben, ever the dreamer, wants to go back up. Wolfgang, the cautious and calculating one, wants to run more tests, whereas Darren just waits for the other two to decide what's next. The three male actors do a great job with their parts, and have a very natural chemistry on screen. After the boys have some fun flying around in their homemade UFO, the film takes an interesting turn, as they lift up off the ground again, but a little too high this time and discover themselves in space. Out of their depth and out of this world, they continue to Explore, each of them wearing their usual hat; Dreamer, Thinker and Doer. A winning combination when it comes to being the first human beings to meet some unusual and unorthodox aliens.Explorers stands as one of my personal favourite childhood movies from the 1980's. The idea was a classic example of letting kids be kids and do the things they dreamt about. Ben, Darren and Wolfgang were heroes, because they took their idea, and made it happen. No adults could stop them, and with boundless persistence and plenty of dedication, it worked. Along with a dose of pure imagination and endless energy, the Explorers proved the sky wasn't just the limit – it was the destination.

NotAnotherMovieCritic This is by no means the best kids film of the 80s, but it is in the top 10 on my list.The story follows three boys who through a dream build a new program that creates a corporeal sphere that takes them and their newly built spaceship out of junkyard pieces into the far reaches of space.It's definitely a kids film, but also a good film altogether for people who like this sort of genre. The film in my eyes starts out pretty good then sort of drifts away when you get to see the creature in the film, which was a little corny in my eyes, but hey it's 80s.If your looking for some vintage kid movies to watch from the 80s then this is a pretty good choice to make.

Leofwine_draca I'm a big fan of Joe Dante's oeuvre, although I'm more disposed towards his adult audience films (like PIRANHA and THE HOWLING) over his out-and-out kid's flicks. Saying that, EXPLORERS is still a decent kid's movie that manages to successfully capture that magical feel of danger and exploration of the best genre films. In many ways it's similar in feel to THE GOONIES, made on a lower budget perhaps but without the cloying sentimentality that Spielberg brought to GOONIES.There's plenty to like in EXPLORERS, not least the spirit of inventiveness and invention that allows the kids to build their own spaceship using trash and one of the most dated computers you'll see on screen (128k of memory? Wow!). Dante did well to cast Ethan Hawke and River Phoenix in the main roles, as both show off the talent that would make them successful later on in their careers. Plus there's a decent-sized cameo from Dick Miller and James Cromwell cast against type as a mad inventor.Although I never watched this film all the way through as a kid, I remember being put off by what I saw of the rubbery aliens. Even now they disappoint, although I understand that they're included as a sort of satire of American TV and culture, but they take the film towards GREMLINS territory rather than a kid's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. Sadly, it's the budget deficit that prevents EXPLORERS from being a true genre classic, but you can still rely on Dante to deliver an entertaining movie for the most part.