Romancing the Stone
**I wrote about what makes Joan Wilder such a great character over at In Their Own League here.
Robert Zemeckis has become best known for his big-budget adventures that entertain the masses and push the boundaries of storytelling. Films like “Back to the Future,” “Forrest Gump,” “The Polar Express” and “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?”. Those are terrific films, but one of his best is a more modest effort– 1984’s “Romancing the Stone.” It very much falls into the adventure mold of a lot of his biggest movies, but it’s grounded more in character than it is in a big hook, although it has that, as well. There’s something a little more personal about this film, though, not so much for Zemeckis but for the screenwriter, Diane Thomas. Thomas pitched this story while working in a cafe in LA to the film’s eventual star-producer, Michael Douglas, who liked the pitch so much he decided to make it. This was Thomas’s only produced work, as she died in a car accident shortly after the film was released. If this was any indication of her talent, we truly missed out.
“Romancing the Stone’s” big pull is that it follows a writer of harlequin romance novels who ends up in an adventure of her own when her sister is kidnapped in Columbia. When we first meet Joan Wilder (Kathleen Turner), she’s putting the finishing touches on her latest novel, which we see in an elaborate sequence that Wilder is narrating. Wilder’s real life isn’t as romantic as the stories she writes– her apartment is full of reminders for her to do things (such as, get more tissues, which she needs after having a good cry from ending her book), and her only companion is her cat. As she goes to show her publisher her finished product, a neighbor gives her a package from Columbia that was too big to fit in her mailbox; it’s addressed from her brother-in-law, who was brutally murdered recently. When she gets back, her apartment has been ransacked, and she gets a panicked phone call from her sister (Mary Ellen Trainor), who has been kidnapped by people wanting the map in the package Joan was sent. Almost immediately after she arrives in Columbia, she is led astray by one of the interested parties in the map, a ruthless murderer named Zolo (Manuel Ojeda), although she’s rescued by a rugged loner (Jack T. Colton, played by Douglas), who becomes her guide to her sister. Colton gets more than he bargained for, though, as this situation gets infinitely complicated with every step he and Joan take.
This was Zemeckis’s third feature as a director, but his first hit film, and once he landed with “Back to the Future,” there was no going back. “Romancing the Stone” is a great curtain raiser for the director. The script by Thomas is more than just a silly romantic adventure, though, but a smart, sexy thrill ride about a woman who has spent her life living in the fantasies she writes, but not really living in real life. Now, she gets swept up in an adventure of her own, and while she’s understandably hesitant, at first, she eventually embraces by Jack has to offer her. Yeah, it’s not realistic, but Zemeckis and the actors embrace the reality of Thomas’s script to create a truly special movie. Douglas and Turner have great chemistry together, as they continued to show in this film’s lesser sequel, “The Jewel of the Nile,” as well as another film, “War of the Roses.” There’s a third piece of the film’s casting puzzle that came along for the ride in those other films, and that’s Danny DeVito, who here plays Ralph, the put-upon cousin of the man holding Joan’s sister hostage. DeVito is hilarious, with his diminutive statue making his attempts at being menacing rich comedic gold, although he’s matched in the strong support category by Alfonso Arau as a drug kingpin they happen on to…who happens to be a big fan of Joan’s. The film’s structure is basically a case of one damn thing after another happening to our heroes, but unlike a lot of lesser films, those “damn things” aren’t all to the detriment of the main characters on their journey. This is the type of movie Hollywood needs to learn from, not try to duplicate. Everybody is working at peak form here, and trying to do something that is alternately familiar, but also fresh. They succeed beautifully, and the result is a wonderful entertainment.
There are a great many people whose work on this film contributes to it’s success, but one that doesn’t always get the credit he deserves is composer Alan Silvestri, who would become Zemeckis’s go-to composer. Silvestri has continued to do great work over the years, but the ’80s arguably represent him at his finest, and most versatile, and it starts with this score. It’s very much an ’80s score in it’s sound, with drum machines and guitars defining it more than orchestral work, but it’s a perfect match for the film it accompanies. Apparently, this was originally intended to be a temp score, but Zemeckis liked it so much he decided to keep it. Wise choice, and the beginning of one of the most engaging director-composer collaborations in recent memory. That alone makes “Romancing the Stone” a lovely gift to audiences, but there’s nothing that really keeps it from that, to begin with.
