The Blue Lagoon

Often while watching this movie I asked myself, How would filmmakers tackle this or that scene today, 25 years later? And while I am certainly not going to applaud 'The Blue Lagoon' as an overlooked masterpiece, CERTAINLY not!, it is still a far cry better than the standard teenage soft-porn that is on offer today.

Basically, 'The Blue Lagoon' is about two horny teenagers finding their own path towards sexual fulfillment and adulthood, and it strives to point the way for its multitudes of teenage audiences with some dignity and even fearlessness. Today footage of completely naked infants as well as pre-teens and teens would simply never be realized or even permitted in mainstream OR art cinema, God forbid! Brooke Shields' frank alluding to Christopher Atkins' masturbatory habits could, in a movie today, only be filmed amidst a sea of giggles, whereas in 1980 they did it very deadpan and honestly.

The film is full of quite touching scenes and gently, if not exactly marvelously acted. I liked Atkins' prayer that the sick Shields be saved, and he doesn't remember how a prayer goes: "Our Father who art in Heaven ... Kingdom come ... Liberty and justice for all. Amen". They don't lead terribly eventful lives on that desert island, but their everyday rituals are beautifully filmed, and the underwater sequences are memorable.

This movie is about love and romance. It is about 2 children who are stranded forced to learn everything about survival and life on there own. They are also forced to deal with very adult issues on their own such as Patty's death. Patty was the only adult to be stranded with them. His death came when he found a keg of rum, got drunk and decided to swim for his rescue. This happened shortly after they were marooned and the kids found him dead in the morning. Up until that point Patty had been giving them advice and trying to raise them the best that he could. I found it charming that they still had the vocabulary of a child even into adulthood but gradually they started figuring more things out, for instance, there is a big scene about Emeline realizing that there really a Santa and that the sun doesn't really make a hissing sound when it sinks into the ocean each night.

There was some press at the time about them, (Christpher Atkins, and Brooke Shields) doing nude scenes which resulted in them not actually being nude at all in the film, they are wearing body stockings in the water.

My review has nothing to do with the perfect beauty of Brooke Shields because I am a straight female. Brooke was at her most radiant.

One excellent part of the film comes after the two have been bickering for days and then Emeline becomes sick and falls asleep. It forced the viewer to think about how much grief would be felt by one if the other should die, really all they had was each other and eventually a baby. Everything depended on them both staying alive.

I believe that anyone who didn't love this movie as much as me, missed the entire story somehow. It wasn't about Brooke being nude and it wasn't about life in paradise it was about innocence. This was a huge hit film back in it's day and launched Brooke's career into super stardom.

Although panned by most critics, this film represents something we all want: love and beauty. Beauty, on more levels than just Brooke Shields' tan, in being true love, without the "corruption" of western culture, feelings of guilt or shame. Though being called unrealistic- is it really? If we all went back to a simpler way of life, cut through the complicated nature of everyday life, could we not be more stable, and find true love? I enjoyed this film, it was witty, innocent, and beautiful.

I have always liked this film, and don't like it when it is criticized so much. Brooke Shields and Christopher Atkins did a wonderful job, they were excellent. Brooke is a beautiful, talented actress. The scenery was just gorgeous, it makes you want to fly off to Fiji where they filmed most of the movie to see what it is really like. The music is also very good. The story starts out with a ship which catches fire, and everyone is forced to abandon ship. Two young children, Richard and Emmeline, as well as a drunken cook named Paddy, get on a lifeboat together and drift on the sea for many days, until they discover land, a bunch of little remote tropical islands. They build a home there. Time passes, and Paddy passes away, but Richard and Emmeline continue growing up together. They get older, and new feelings come over them. They discover many things about adolescence and sex. This is a great love story, sweet and lovable. Brooke and Chris make a great onscreen couple. The sex/nudity scenes are not really that bad at all, they're rather mild. There is more nudity in the underwater swimming sequences, but mostly all of that was done by Brooke's stand-in, a professional diver. I really like this movie, and even though there are a few logic loopholes, it is still enjoyable. My only complaint: I think this film could've gone on for about 5 more mins. or so and explained things a little bit better.

When I was 17 years old I stayed up till 3am one night to watch a late showing of this film. I had seen clips of 'The Blue Lagoon' when I was younger and it always remained embedded in my mind. The truth is that no movie has ever affected me like this one. I didn't know what force made me feel such deep sensations - whether it was the magnificent exotic island, Emmeline's beauty, the heart-capturing sound track or a combination of all - all I knew is that I longed to be there. I longed to be in such an idealistic and beautiful haven (no matter how unrealistic it seemed). But now I've come to live in the 'real world'. All I can do now is appreciate the idea of the film and the important themes it represents. Such a dream only exists in Heaven.