This weekend during what I often refer to as "The Best Year Ever" or 1982, my most favorite childhood movie of all time opened in theaters. Yes, Friday, June 11, 1982 was the day E.T. opened in Long Island theaters. The movie theater setting the backdrop for this momentous occasion was called Sunrise Cinemas, located on Sunrise Highway in Valley Stream.
This multiplex theater was amazing back in the early 1980s. Sunrise Cinemas featured so many different movies and weekend matinées. Coleco games filled the waiting area allowing us kids to kill time and engage in a few rounds of Ladybug while our folks waited on line for movie tickets.
As much as I loved E.T. and saw it 14 times in the theater that year, one horrendous line in the movie somewhat tarnishes my pleasant memory. Wedged between my parents and six-year-old brother in a jam-packed theater, a 9-year-old me had to endure one of my very first embarrassing moments.
What could that possibly be? When Elliott (my love, Henry Thomas) blurts out this horrible name for his brother, Michael (Robert MacNaughton). I can't even type it. To this day I'm still embarrassed. So you'll have to just watch it here on YouTube. It's only 15 seconds, so sit tight and check it out.
I was surprised to learn the line was later removed for the DVD release, interesting. Too bad it wasn't removed when it mattered to me most, back in 1982!
Elliot in E.T. to his big brother Michael, "It was nothing like that ..."
