Review of The Blue Lagoon

Two kids (cousins!) become stranded on an island with a fat old drunk who yells a lot. Eventually the drunk dies and they're left to fend for themselves. As the kids become teenagers, they turn into Christopher Atkins and Brooke Shields. It's at this point that the movie becomes what it's famous for being: two attractive teens discovering sex in the wild. Most people are either going to think this is a story of innocent love unhindered by societal conventions or they'll see it as a cheap piece of exploitation. I'm trying my best to view it as the former but the cynic in me finds it hard to deny that the latter is probably the only reason this was green-lit in the first place. For the record, if you haven't seen it, the nudity does not only come from Atkins and Shields (or her adult body double in some scenes) but from the pre-teen children playing the younger versions of their characters as well.

Judging the movie on its technical merits, it's pretty hard to deny that the gorgeous island scenery and the nice score are big pluses. But the story is paper thin and the acting is atrocious. There is potential for a good movie here, if it were treated as a realistic story of two kids struggling to survive while also dealing with growing into puberty with no adults around to guide them. But director Randal Kleiser is more focused on flesh peddling and the single most insipid romance to ever hit the screen. As it is, we're left with a curiosity that isn't a good film at all but will hold a salacious appeal for some viewers.