'Harry and the Hendersons'

Publish date: 2024-07-07
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‘Harry and the Hendersons’

By Desson Howe
Washington Post Staff Writer
June 05, 1987
 


Director:
William Dear
Cast:
John Lithgow;
Melinda Dillon;
Don Ameche;
Lainie Kazan;
David Suchet
PG
Parental guidance suggested
Oscars:
Makeup

In the beginning was "E.T.": a film about an otherworldly visitor to suburbia. Then there was "ALF": A TV series about an otherworldly visitor to suburbia. Now there's "Harry and the Hendersons."

Yup.

This time, the oddball after your aaaaawws is none other than Bigfoot

-- he of the trough-sized footprints in the snow. Once again, a furry fella rummages through the icebox and jaunts through the living room. Once again, a Nielsen-average family adopts him and protects him from society. And, once again, he foams home.

The Henderson family is straight from TV's global village. Dad (a competent John Lithgow) is upright and kinda geeky. Mom (Melinda Dillon, or is it Meredith Baxter Birney?) is terminally sensitive. Son Ernie (Joshua Rudoy) is a frogs 'n' snails brat. And daughter Sarah (Margaret Langrick, or is it Justine Bateman?) is sultry, listless and spoilt. On a camping trip, the family runs into Bigfoot with the station wagon -- in the forest, there are no Walk signs. So Dad trusses the unconscious hulk to the car and takes him home, hoping to sell Harry to Science for big bucks. This is America, after all.

But, shucks, the family becomes fond of the would-be roadkill. After he wakes up cranky and rampages through the house, crunching stairs and floorboards to matchwood under his awesome tread, the lunk turns out to be lovable. His eyes twinkle even more sickeningly than Yoda's, he cries over Dad's stuffed kills and it turns out he's a vegetarian. And though all of this qualifies him for immediate West Coast residency, the family sees the Outward Bound light: Harry must go home.

But, as always, there are complications. Harry gets spotted around town -- he is seven feet tall, shaggier than a yak and given to atavistic howling. Suddenly everyone, from rifle-toting wackos (in the movies, all rifle-toters are wackos) to a relentless French trapper named Jacques LaFleur, is on the Bigfoot hunt. Can E.T. -- er, Harry -- make it back to the woods intact?

You'll have to see "Harry" to find out. But if you fork over the money for a ticket to this one, you'll have to share the blame for next year's movies about a fishboy from Atlantis, a gentle Gerbnoid from Mars and a warmhearted Ice Age survivor named Bunkie.

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