Real Live Stuff

Shot on film, The Goonies is fortunately devoid of CGI or other over-the-top special effects. That pirate ship was built by actual people out of actual materials—it's not computer animated. Those bats were made out of papier-mâché. There were no skeletons getting up and walking around, waving swords around and looking menacing. (No offense, Pirates of the Caribbean. We think you're swell.)

Why does that make a difference? Because it seems real. It's the same reason the first three Star Wars movies were huge hits and the next three were complete duds. The movements of Jabba the Hutt might have looked a little silly at times, but at least you could tell the actors were interacting with a real thing, and not just prancing about in front of a green screen.

In The Goonies, the production allows us to lose ourselves in the kids' adventure. It looks almost as if someone went down there with them with a handheld video camera (and maybe a few lighting and sound guys). Everything looks simple, natural, and perfect.

Honestly, the most impressive special effect in the entire film was making actor John Matuszak turn into Sloth.