Stand by Me : How many of you were actually around in 1986?

I know we have a lot of young people here. I was 13, and my older sister took me to see Stand by Me. R rated movies NEVER effected me. I miss those old vhs machines also.

And all of the girls at my school just loved River Phoenix. He obviously was an 80's heartthrob with the thick haired girls.

I had just turned 21 when SBM went into general North American release. My girlfriend who was 20 at the time really wanted to see it (she'd read the story, I hadn't). After it was over, we got up and left as soon as the credits started.

On the way to her place she asked me what I thought, and I said it was amazing. She then told me it was based on a Stephen King story. I was shocked. At that point the only SK I'd read were his horror stories.

To this day, it's still one of my favourite movies










"Hogs have futures, I don't."
Dr. Johnny Fever

I was five :)

I turned 13 over the summer it was released and was quite affected by the movie. I remember leaving the innocence of elementary school behind to start junior high that fall and what Dreyfus said in the movie was so true: "Friends come in and out of your life like busboys in a restaurant". Some of the people I was close to in elementary school (including my best friend at the time) became just another face in the hallway once I moved on to 7th grade.

I also was about their age when the movie came out so it had a similarly large impact on me too. I remember thinking back then how I would never lose touch with my group of friends at the time and that happened with all of them!

"Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man."

:)

I was 18ish when my gf (now wife of 27 years) saw it. I remember that line from the book and the movie, it stays with you. I got an email about an hour ago from a guy I met in Jr. High (1980) and it was as if nothing changed. We still call each other stupid nicknames and I asked him when middle age is suppose to kick in.

I'm close in age to all four of the leads (younger than Phoenix, Feldman and Wheaton, older than O'Connell). For some reason I didn't see it in the theater, but my friends and I rented it for a sleepover when it first came out and we all dreamboated out on River. (We loved the movie too, we weren't purely hormonal.) Although my childhood happened almost 30 years after the time period in the movie, it wasn't a whole lot different - I grew up in a small town (though only an hour north of New York City) and we used to explore the woods for hours on end and hang out way past dark. Parents rarely checked up on us as long as they had some idea where we were - and we all made it to adulthood alive. It's a shame things are so different now, I had a great childhood in the sense of how my friends and I spent our time.

The further a society drifts from the truth, the more it will hate those that speak it.

ACTUALLY around? 32 is the median age in America and this came out almost 30 years ago. Late summer to be exact that I remember. I was 18. I liked it, but disappointed that Richard Dreyfuss and John Cusack barely appeared and almost everyone else was an unknown at the time.

32 is the median age eh? That's something, I'm 32 myself. Yeah I was only about 3 when this film came out. Suffice it to say I didn't see it until a few years after it came out.

"Oh my God! You is becoming a werewilf!" -Werewolf

Well said. My friends and I were about their age too and we also watched it at a sleep over while hearting over River - and probably fighting over which one of us would be his girlfriend if given the opportunity. This movie brings nostalgia in many ways.

"Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man."

I was 16 years old when this came out and I did see it in the theaters.

I was 5 years old when i saw this in theaters.

"Unicorn, mermaid, vampire,sorceress! No name you'd give her would surprise me i love whom i love"

I was probably around 8yrs old when I first saw it. It was hilarious, to see boys curse so much for kicks.

It wasn't until about 10yrs later when I truly lost myself in its greatness.

top 50 http://www.imdb.com/list/ls056413299/

I watched in 86 as a 16 year old. It's only gained stature with me ever since. I rank it a 10 on here, which I almost never do.

This is an amazing movie.

I was 16 when this came out. Loved it then, love it now.

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I was 16 when this came out. Loved it then, love it now.

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You were the same age as River Phoenix when the movie was filmed

Just finished junior year of high school.

I was nineteen when the film hit theaters and saw it when it went into wide release. Big Stephen King fan and the reviews of the film were all stellar. It was a matinee show and, unfortunately, some idiot kid in the back of the theater kept "mock crying" whenever someone wept on screen. Just making fun of the film for no other reason than for being a creep.

This little jerk, who has undoubtedly forgotten all about his boorish behavior, totally spoiled the experience of what was (and still is) an exceptional movie.

Sadly after all these years I still remember this wanker kid and his immature conduct affecting the experience of seeing this.

Thanks a lot, d***head.

I was 15 when the movie was released in the United States, and 16 when I saw it for the first time on HBO/Showtime. I am less than a month older than Corey Feldman.

I was 17 when this movie came out. And I still use my "old vhs machine"! LOL

I was 7 at the time and at some point, my parents stopped carrying about me watching rated R movies. Although in retrospect, it's funny how bad movies like Robocop looked. Nevertheless, The 80's are a nostalgic decade for me, especially the music. I just hated big hair rock bands. I mostly listened to Pop and R&B. The Cure was to weird for me at the time, but I eventually grew out of that closed mindset that I had. New Order was good, but I never had any of their albums on cassette tape, or vinyl. My Bloody Valentine, The Pixies, now those are bands that I didn't appreciate until I learned that my favorite bands in the 90's looked up to them. As for VHS, my family preferred Betamax. We didn't switchover until we had to. You know, as convenient as things have become, I miss renting movies, & going to the record store. Searching through the endless shelves of cassette tapes. Those were the good old days.

Not me. I came around slightly afterwards. I saw this movie on TV and instantly fell in love with it. My aunt actually bought me the movie on DVD several years after I saw it, and it remains to this day as my favorite film of all time.

I was 13 as well and I like the movie but don't love it. If I watch it today it's only for nostalgia purposes.

I was 13 when it came out. I honestly cannot remember how I saw it as I did both a lot of movie theater movies, pay TV movies and VHS movies in the 80s.

I was 25 in 1986 but didn't watch SBM until early 1988 when I rented it on vhs.
Due to the selfishness of a minority of cinema-goers I rarely if ever go to watch a new movie in public because I cannot bear the murmuring, food packet rustling or general presence of others around me while 'sharing' a movie experience.
I almost always wait until the dvd is available and watch it at home to avoid things such as earlier poster Doug1967 had with a kid mock crying in the cinema and spoiling the showing for him.
I own the dvd of SBM and watch it around once per year, it's still among my top few movies of all time and I doubt if anything newer will ever out-exceed it.

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I own the dvd of SBM and watch it around once per year, it's still among my top few movies of all time and I doubt if anything newer will ever out-exceed it.

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I felt the same way. Saw SBM dozens of times over 30 years. Still is my Favorite. I even made a trip to Oregon and California just to see some of the filming locations, including the train trestle bridge in Burney Ca.
Now I just saw another amazing film this summer, " Sing Street". See it on DVD now or streaming. Its now my second favorite film of all time just under SBM.

I was 10 years old when this film was released, but didn't catch until the next year on HBO. It was a favorite from the very first viewing and still is. I love the short story too, but I actually enjoy the film more. Those four guys were my "friends" when I was 11-12 and going through a rough time at school.

I was 13 when I went to see this at the cinema, me and 3 of my mates, it used to be 50p to get into the cinema, but one of us would pay to get in and then go to the fire exit round the back letting our other mates in.
I also remember paying to see movies then sneaking into the 18 rated movies, me and my mates got caught in Predator, the lady shining a torch onto us and putting us back into the original film we had paid to see, lol.
I remember seeing this film and there were only about another 4 or 5 people in the theatre at the time, loved this film when it first came out.

This came out just before our senior year in HS. Stand By Me was our class song - and during graduation week they showed this in the gym Seems like yesterday, yet seems like a lifetime ago I am now 47 and Steven King, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas are living heroes to me! Peace and River - out

I definitely was. In fact, I turned 18 in 1986 (March 5), graduated from high school (June 7), got my driver's lisence (August 6), and went off to begin college (August 22). And I have thought about the year 1986 a lot since then, because it was a very significant year for me (because of the above reasons), though unfortunately not a particularly good one. But as I said I have thought about it a lot in the years since, and even more so this year because it's the 30th anniversary. And you said you first saw it because your older sister took you to it. Well I first saw it because my younger sister brought it on VHS in 1989, which led me to see it several times on our VCRs. And I too miss the old VHS machines, and in some aspects prefer them to the current dvd players. And since you were 13 in 1986 I'm guessing you were born in 1973 and yourself turned 18, graduated from high school, and began college in 1991. I'm I correct?

"I happen to be a vegetarian". Lex, from Jurrasic Park

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I'm guessing you were born in 1973 and yourself turned 18, graduated from high school, and began college in 1991. I'm I correct?

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And we were watching the Gulf war from our classrooms. With tv sets just like this one:

I had just turned 15 a few days before this came out, but I didn't see it in the theater. A friend of mine rented it a few months later and we watched it there.

The line about having friends like you did when you were 12 (or in my case, 15) rings so true to me today now that I'm 45. I spent the better part of 4 years with my crew, literally almost every day hanging out with them, playing every sport, going to the movies, or just sitting around shooting the breeze.

Eventually, I met the girl who ended up being my wife and I just sort of started to drift apart from them, but some of them went down the wrong road in life. 2 of my good friends passed away, including the one whose house I saw this and many other rented movies in, and others just started doing drugs, while some of the others just went down a better path.

I have since reconnected with most of them via Facebook and I am happy to see that some have families of their own and even the ones who had some struggles seem to have overcome them and that makes me feel good but nothing can ever replace the times we had back during the carefree days of being kids. Funny how people you spend almost every waking hour with for several years can just no longer be in your life.

I was 11, around the same age as the kids were. I was going through the same things they were going through, so the movie hit me pretty hard. Still does.

I was 9 when the movie hit the theatres, but for some reason (I really can't explain it) have never seen it until today - finished it half an hour ago to be exact.

I've seen the Ben E. King's video with Wheaton and Phoenix (and scenes from the movie) thousands of times in the late 80's, perhaps I've seen a couple of scenes when it ran on TV (I do vividly remember the scene with leaches on balls and when they run from the train, but nothing else), but have never seen the film from the beginning to the end until today. Weird. Perhaps I missed it at that time as a kid, and always mistakenly thought of it as a 'kids' movie when I was a teenager and later on, I knew of its cult status as one of the best movies of the 80's, but for some reason I never had had the wish to see it.

Great movie. Really loved it. I gave it 9 stars here at IMDB, the highest mark I've given so far.

I knew two people who walked out of the theater during the vomiting scene. I didn't see the film until it came out on VHS. Glad I did because it was one of the best films of the year. Wil Weaten lived around the corner from me at the time (Sunland). Didn't know him well but knew he was into science fiction stuff.

I was 7 when it came out, but I doubt I saw it in the theater, so I was probably a few years older when I saw it for the first time.

I can remember watching it over and over after I taped it off TV. I had the biggest crush on Keifer Sutherland, so some days when I didn't feel like watching the whole thing, I'd fast forward to just his parts. Gotta love VCRs

I was 21.

I was born in '87 so I saw it many years later. It's one of my favourites though!

Also one of my favorites. In 1986, I was around 7 or so. We went to a movie theater in Waco, Texas to see it during a midnight show. My Dad never cared much for ratings and used a little known thing known as "parental experience" and knew I was old enough to understand, comprehend, and enjoy the story with no adverse affects.

True enough, watching this movie and even sitting through the end credits because we loved the music, is one of my best memories. I remember it being one the very first times I watched any movie all the way through from the first preview of another movie to the last credit screen, this was long before Marvel movies made sitting through credits a thing.

I was really into 50's cars and music, even at age 7, and I still am. So, this movie was a boon to me at that age.

Great memories, great times, great film.

I was 4 years old.

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I was 4 years old.

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me too! i was born in nov of 1982 oppps i just saw what month it came out, i guess i was going on 4 lol

"CONDOMS ROSE CONDOMS CONDOMS CONDOMS!!" Bea Arthur AKA Dorothy Zbornak

I was 12. Saw it in the theatre.

It was the summer after I was liberated (graduated) from high school. I was going to buy a poster and bring it to my reuinion (along with other movies that were released that summer.

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I was one.

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