When Michael Eisner was passed over as Paramount chairman in favor of Frank Mancuso in 1984, one casualty was Joe Dante ‘s Explorers . The unfinished film about three kids building a spaceship from a TV set and basement junk was rushed into release early in the summer of 1985. The THR’s review read, “At least the boys were able to get their contraption off the ground in the film. which is more than this monstrosity is likely to do for Paramount at the box office.” (The film grossed $9.9 million, less than half its budget.) Today, Dante is only half-joking when he calls Explorers “my Magnificent Ambersons,” referring to Orson Welles’ famously studio-mangled work. However, the film did mark the feature debuts of the late River Phoenix and Ethan Hawke, who was 13 when he arrived for a casting call.
