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The Good Son (1993 film)
Encyclopedia
The Good Son is a 1993 psychological thriller
film directed by Joseph Ruben
and written by English novelist Ian McEwan
. The film stars Macaulay Culkin
and Elijah Wood
.
, 12-year-old Mark Evans (Elijah Wood
) is playing a soccer game, until his father Jack (David Morse
) appears and takes him to the hospital to visit his dying mother, Janice. After her death, Jack tries to console his son, but to no avail as Mark maintains the belief that his mother will return. Having been assigned for a business trip to Tokyo
, Japan
, Jack takes Mark to stay with his uncle Wallace (Daniel Hugh Kelly
) and aunt Susan (Wendy Crewson
). Upon reaching the Evans' house in Maine
, Mark is introduced to his extended family, including his cousins Connie (Quinn Culkin) and Henry Evans (Macaulay Culkin
). Mark and Henry get along at first, and Henry seems to be nice and well-mannered. In discussing the death of Mark's mother and that of Henry's younger brother Richard, however, Henry expresses an abnormal fascination with death, making Mark uneasy.
Henry continues to display increasingly psychotic behaviour, using a homemade crossbow to kill a neighbor's dog and cheerfully dropping a dummy onto a local highway, causing a pileup. Although nobody was killed in the crashes, or even seriously injured, Mark is horrified at Henry's actions and tries to tell Wallace. Henry drives him away, threatening to 'reveal' that causing the crash was actually Mark's idea.
Later, Henry implies that he will try to kill his sister. He then takes her ice skating the following morning and purposely shoves her toward the thin ice. The ice collapses and Connie falls in the icy water, nearly drowning before she is rescued by passersby and taken to the hospital. Mark again attempts to tell Susan the situation, but he is immediately dismissed as lying. Susan becomes skeptical of Henry, however, when she finds a rubber duck in Henry's shed. It had once belonged to Richard and was with him in the bathtub the night he drowned, after which it went missing. When Susan confronts Henry, he quickly becomes furious, insisting that the duck was his before it was Richard's. Henry snatches the duck back and throws it down a well near the house.
Mark phones his father and informs him of the situation and Henry's increasing psychotic acts. His father is also somewhat dismissive and tells Mark he'll be home soon. In the meantime, he tells Mark to go to Dr. Alice Davenport, the local psychologist, and tell her of the situation. However, when he arrives, he finds that Henry is already there, twisting the situation to make it look like Mark is the one committing the psychotic acts.
After Mark tells Henry that "Susan's my mother now", Henry indirectly implies that he will kill Susan. In a fit of rage, Mark grabs a pair of scissors and jumps on Henry, pressing them to Henry's neck. As Henry arrogantly eggs Mark on to kill him, Wallace enters the room. Seeing Mark about to kill Henry, Wallace locks Mark in the den to await Dr. Davenport. Meanwhile, Susan arrives and goes on a walk with Henry. Mark escapes the den and chases them.
Susan confronts Henry about Richard's death and asks Henry firmly if he murdered his brother, to which he implies that he did. He then runs off into the woods in fear of being committed to a psychiatric hospital. Susan chases him, afraid he will try to kill himself. She arrives at a cliff, which leads her to believe Henry has jumped into the water below. Henry suddenly appears behind her, amused at having fooled his mother yet again, and shoves Susan off the cliff. She narrowly catches a branch on the way down and holds on, while Henry picks up a large rock which he intends to throw down at her. As he prepares to throw it, Mark arrives and tackles Henry, and they fight while Susan tries climbing back on to the ledge. In the ensuing brawl, they roll off the edge of the cliff, and are caught by Susan after climbing back up to the ledge. She arduously hangs on to each boy with one hand, slowly losing her grasp of both Henry and Mark.
Wanting to save them both, and yet understanding she can save only one of them, Henry tries to force Susan to bring him her other hand so that he would complete his goal, while Mark tries to warn her that Henry'll kill her and her family so that he can get his revenge. Seeing Mark's way of telling the truth and forgiving him, she makes the painful decision to let go of Henry thus dropping him to his death to save her family and to rescue Mark. She pulls him up, and they both look down to see Henry's dead body on the rocks below, which is washed away into the sea. Susan and Mark then share an emotional embrace as Mark saved his family from being killed.
When Mark returns to Arizona, he goes to a large rocky hill in order to be alone with his thoughts. He wonders about Susan and if she would again make the same choice to save him instead of Henry.
. Roger Ebert
, who deemed the film inappropriate for children, awarded it just half a star, calling the project a "creepy, unpleasant experience". He and Gene Siskel
later gave it "Two Thumbs Down".
"Here you have America's favorite kid throwing a dummy off of a little bridge over a roadway, causing an accident. That scares me. I think it's highly irresponsible to show a youngster doing something like that. I think if kids go see the picture, some are likely to imitate it." Gene Siskel interview on ABC News
.
The Good Son received US$
44,789,789 at the North American box office
revenues, and another $15,823,219 in other territories, for a total worldwide box office take of $60,613,008.
Elijah Wood won Saturn Award for Best Performance by a Young Actor
, Macaulay Culkin was nominated for an MTV Movie Award
for Best Villain
.
Psychological thriller
Psychological thriller is a specific sub-genre of the broad ranged thriller with heavy focus on characters. However, it often incorporates elements from the mystery and drama genre, along with the typical traits of the thriller genre...
film directed by Joseph Ruben
Joseph Ruben
Joseph Paul Ruben is an American film director, screenwriter, and producer.-Movie career:Most of his earlier films are B movies, of which some, such as The Stepfather have become cult classics...
and written by English novelist Ian McEwan
Ian McEwan
Ian Russell McEwan CBE, FRSA, FRSL is a British novelist and screenwriter, and one of Britain's most highly regarded writers. In 2008, The Times named him among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945"....
. The film stars Macaulay Culkin
Macaulay Culkin
Macaulay Carson Culkin is an American actor. He became widely known for his portrayal of Kevin McCallister in Home Alone and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. He is also known for his roles in Richie Rich, Uncle Buck, My Girl, The Pagemaster, and Party Monster...
and Elijah Wood
Elijah Wood
Elijah Jordan Wood is an American actor. He made his film debut with a minor part in Back to the Future Part II , then landed a succession of larger roles that made him a critically acclaimed child actor by age 9. He is best known for his high-profile role as Frodo Baggins in Peter Jackson's...
.
Plot
In ArizonaArizona
Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix...
, 12-year-old Mark Evans (Elijah Wood
Elijah Wood
Elijah Jordan Wood is an American actor. He made his film debut with a minor part in Back to the Future Part II , then landed a succession of larger roles that made him a critically acclaimed child actor by age 9. He is best known for his high-profile role as Frodo Baggins in Peter Jackson's...
) is playing a soccer game, until his father Jack (David Morse
David Morse (actor)
David Bowditch Morse is an American stage, television, and film actor. He first came to national attention as Dr. Jack Morrison in the medical drama St. Elsewhere from 1982 to 1988...
) appears and takes him to the hospital to visit his dying mother, Janice. After her death, Jack tries to console his son, but to no avail as Mark maintains the belief that his mother will return. Having been assigned for a business trip to Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, Jack takes Mark to stay with his uncle Wallace (Daniel Hugh Kelly
Daniel Hugh Kelly
Daniel Hugh Kelly is an American stage, film and television actor. He may be best known for his role on the 1980s ABC TV series Hardcastle and McCormick from 1983-1986 for which he also wrote and directed...
) and aunt Susan (Wendy Crewson
Wendy Crewson
-Life and career:Crewson was born in Hamilton, Ontario, the daughter of June Doreen and Robert Binnie Crewson. She attended Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, where she won the prestigious Lorne Greene Award for outstanding work in the theater. She then studied at the Webber Douglas Academy...
). Upon reaching the Evans' house in Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
, Mark is introduced to his extended family, including his cousins Connie (Quinn Culkin) and Henry Evans (Macaulay Culkin
Macaulay Culkin
Macaulay Carson Culkin is an American actor. He became widely known for his portrayal of Kevin McCallister in Home Alone and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. He is also known for his roles in Richie Rich, Uncle Buck, My Girl, The Pagemaster, and Party Monster...
). Mark and Henry get along at first, and Henry seems to be nice and well-mannered. In discussing the death of Mark's mother and that of Henry's younger brother Richard, however, Henry expresses an abnormal fascination with death, making Mark uneasy.
Henry continues to display increasingly psychotic behaviour, using a homemade crossbow to kill a neighbor's dog and cheerfully dropping a dummy onto a local highway, causing a pileup. Although nobody was killed in the crashes, or even seriously injured, Mark is horrified at Henry's actions and tries to tell Wallace. Henry drives him away, threatening to 'reveal' that causing the crash was actually Mark's idea.
Later, Henry implies that he will try to kill his sister. He then takes her ice skating the following morning and purposely shoves her toward the thin ice. The ice collapses and Connie falls in the icy water, nearly drowning before she is rescued by passersby and taken to the hospital. Mark again attempts to tell Susan the situation, but he is immediately dismissed as lying. Susan becomes skeptical of Henry, however, when she finds a rubber duck in Henry's shed. It had once belonged to Richard and was with him in the bathtub the night he drowned, after which it went missing. When Susan confronts Henry, he quickly becomes furious, insisting that the duck was his before it was Richard's. Henry snatches the duck back and throws it down a well near the house.
Mark phones his father and informs him of the situation and Henry's increasing psychotic acts. His father is also somewhat dismissive and tells Mark he'll be home soon. In the meantime, he tells Mark to go to Dr. Alice Davenport, the local psychologist, and tell her of the situation. However, when he arrives, he finds that Henry is already there, twisting the situation to make it look like Mark is the one committing the psychotic acts.
After Mark tells Henry that "Susan's my mother now", Henry indirectly implies that he will kill Susan. In a fit of rage, Mark grabs a pair of scissors and jumps on Henry, pressing them to Henry's neck. As Henry arrogantly eggs Mark on to kill him, Wallace enters the room. Seeing Mark about to kill Henry, Wallace locks Mark in the den to await Dr. Davenport. Meanwhile, Susan arrives and goes on a walk with Henry. Mark escapes the den and chases them.
Susan confronts Henry about Richard's death and asks Henry firmly if he murdered his brother, to which he implies that he did. He then runs off into the woods in fear of being committed to a psychiatric hospital. Susan chases him, afraid he will try to kill himself. She arrives at a cliff, which leads her to believe Henry has jumped into the water below. Henry suddenly appears behind her, amused at having fooled his mother yet again, and shoves Susan off the cliff. She narrowly catches a branch on the way down and holds on, while Henry picks up a large rock which he intends to throw down at her. As he prepares to throw it, Mark arrives and tackles Henry, and they fight while Susan tries climbing back on to the ledge. In the ensuing brawl, they roll off the edge of the cliff, and are caught by Susan after climbing back up to the ledge. She arduously hangs on to each boy with one hand, slowly losing her grasp of both Henry and Mark.
Wanting to save them both, and yet understanding she can save only one of them, Henry tries to force Susan to bring him her other hand so that he would complete his goal, while Mark tries to warn her that Henry'll kill her and her family so that he can get his revenge. Seeing Mark's way of telling the truth and forgiving him, she makes the painful decision to let go of Henry thus dropping him to his death to save her family and to rescue Mark. She pulls him up, and they both look down to see Henry's dead body on the rocks below, which is washed away into the sea. Susan and Mark then share an emotional embrace as Mark saved his family from being killed.
When Mark returns to Arizona, he goes to a large rocky hill in order to be alone with his thoughts. He wonders about Susan and if she would again make the same choice to save him instead of Henry.
Cast
- Macaulay CulkinMacaulay CulkinMacaulay Carson Culkin is an American actor. He became widely known for his portrayal of Kevin McCallister in Home Alone and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. He is also known for his roles in Richie Rich, Uncle Buck, My Girl, The Pagemaster, and Party Monster...
as Henry Evans, the main antagonist. His goal is to kill his own family so he won't be sent to a reformatory. - Elijah WoodElijah WoodElijah Jordan Wood is an American actor. He made his film debut with a minor part in Back to the Future Part II , then landed a succession of larger roles that made him a critically acclaimed child actor by age 9. He is best known for his high-profile role as Frodo Baggins in Peter Jackson's...
as Mark Evans, the protagonist. The death of his mother is what causes him to be left with his relatives in Maine. He is also the first to learn about Henry's wickedness. - Wendy CrewsonWendy Crewson-Life and career:Crewson was born in Hamilton, Ontario, the daughter of June Doreen and Robert Binnie Crewson. She attended Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, where she won the prestigious Lorne Greene Award for outstanding work in the theater. She then studied at the Webber Douglas Academy...
as Susan Evans, the deuteragonist. At first, she doesn't believe Mark when he tries to tell her about how bad Henry is. - David MorseDavid Morse (actor)David Bowditch Morse is an American stage, television, and film actor. He first came to national attention as Dr. Jack Morrison in the medical drama St. Elsewhere from 1982 to 1988...
as Jack Evans, Mark's father. - Daniel Hugh KellyDaniel Hugh KellyDaniel Hugh Kelly is an American stage, film and television actor. He may be best known for his role on the 1980s ABC TV series Hardcastle and McCormick from 1983-1986 for which he also wrote and directed...
as Wallace Evans, Henry's father and Jack's brother. - Jacqueline BrookesJacqueline BrookesJacqueline Victoire Brookes is an American actress known for her work on stage, off and on Broadway.Brookes was born in Montclair, New Jersey, the daughter of Maria Victoire and Frederick Jack Brookes, an investment banker...
as Alice Davenport - Quinn Kay Culkin as Connie Evans
- Rory CulkinRory CulkinRory Hugh Culkin is an American actor and is the younger brother of actors Macaulay Culkin and Kieran Culkin.-Personal life:...
as Richard Evans in Picture
Reception
The film received a mostly negative response from critics, with a 25% overall score on Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
. Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
, who deemed the film inappropriate for children, awarded it just half a star, calling the project a "creepy, unpleasant experience". He and Gene Siskel
Gene Siskel
Eugene Kal "Gene" Siskel was an American film critic and journalist for the Chicago Tribune. Along with colleague Roger Ebert, he hosted the popular review show Siskel & Ebert At the Movies from 1975 until his death....
later gave it "Two Thumbs Down".
"Here you have America's favorite kid throwing a dummy off of a little bridge over a roadway, causing an accident. That scares me. I think it's highly irresponsible to show a youngster doing something like that. I think if kids go see the picture, some are likely to imitate it." Gene Siskel interview on ABC News
ABC News
ABC News is the news gathering and broadcasting division of American broadcast television network ABC, a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company...
.
The Good Son received US$
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
44,789,789 at the North American box office
Box office
A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to an event. Patrons may perform the transaction at a countertop, through an unblocked hole through a wall or window, or at a wicket....
revenues, and another $15,823,219 in other territories, for a total worldwide box office take of $60,613,008.
Elijah Wood won Saturn Award for Best Performance by a Young Actor
Saturn Award for Best Performance by a Younger Actor
The following are a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Performance by a Younger Actor:- References :* , Saturn Awards...
, Macaulay Culkin was nominated for an MTV Movie Award
MTV Movie Awards
The MTV Movie Awards is a film awards show presented annually on MTV . It also contains movie parodies that used official movie footage with hosts and other celebrities and music performances. The nominees are decided by producers and executives at MTV. Winners are decided online by the general...
for Best Villain
MTV Movie Award for Best Villain
This is a following list of the MTV Movie Award winners and nominees for Best Villain.-References:...
.