Better than the original!! Focuses on the character we came to love
Cocoon was very...okay...for me despite it's eighties cult classic
status. I certainly wasn't blown away by it so I didn't have a lot of expectations for it's sequel so maybe that helped but I thought Cocoon: The Return was even better than the original!! They took the best part of Cocoon which was the memorable and classic characters and made a film that solely focused on THEM and their lives and everything about them and very little on the whole alien aspect but enough that it still had that supernatural element and it was just brilliant. Bringing back the original cast, putting them back in the same situations with the same set of moral questions and it was just really fun. I didn't think Cocoon: The Return was nearly as campy or cheesy in dialog or even in the special effects. They didn't use nearly as many of the special effects and what they did use was much better done than the original. Director Daniel Petrie takes over from the far more known Ron Howard and does an excellent job. Petrie has mostly experience from doing TV Films which in a way is good because he's used to telling a story on a lower budget and instead he gets to tell a story with a bigger budget. He's talented to say the least having been nominated for twelve Directors Guild Awards and eight emmys and I give him great kudos for bringing these characters back to us again. Don Ameche, Wilford Brimley, Hume Cronyn, Jack Gilford, Maureen Stapleton, Jessica Tandy, and Gwen Verdon all return as the beloved seniors, most of whom return to visit their families after five years away on the other planet. They are all terrific and really bring their characters alive even more than they did in the original. They have such great chemistry together and their stories are just even more interesting. The film wouldn't be the same without them. Also returning is eighties star Steve Guttenberg who is used a little more sparingly in the sequel and he is even tolerable!! I found him a lot better this time around. Tahnee Welch returns as alien entity Kitty, and she's more of the leader this time around. Welch and Guttenberg are good together but they are both used very little and it works in the favor of the film. Welch is good in the role but comes across as a little robotic. In a rare turn of events the young actor Barret Oliver even returns to the film as Brimley's Grandson. Usually they replace a kid actor in future sequels. A pre-Friends Courteney Cox joins the cast in a relatively small but effective and emotional role and she does very well. The saddest part I thought of the cast was the lack of the amazing Brian Dennehy and imagine my delight when he returned for a small but very cool cameo in the end. For those who loved or even enjoyed the original Cocoon, you just can't help but love that they brought the original cast back for another go around because they really do focus on the great cast. They do add in the sub story about the Aliens wanting to save their friends still in the Ocean and then one of them is taking by an Oceanic research company and they have to help one of them escape...but it's just not the major focus of the film. There are some major plot turns and some really fun moments including the basketball game against the young jocks which I thought was just awesome. I mean I always suggest watching the original film because it is truly an eighties classic that is all about life and being young and turning things around but the sequel really closes a lot of gaps in the story and brings things full circle. It will leave you smiling. 8.5/10. 
A shadow of the original
This is a sequel, and it's better than most sequels. However, most
sequels don't hold up against the original film and this one's no exception. The same cast is back and the acting is certain up to par in this film, but the impact of the story isn't there. I believe this film would have done fairly well had it not been a sequel, but the magic was gone, sorta like the magic from the pool in the first film. The cast does a good acting job and they try, they really do, but this film just doesn't cut the mustard (from whence came THAT expression?) as compared to the first film. I'm sorry, because I truly liked the first film. This is overall a very good film and nicely acted, written and executed. However, as I said, the magic from the first film is just missing because we knew pretty much what to expect. It's sad that few sequels are as good as the original.. |
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