Plot
About 10,000 years ago a group of peaceful alien lifeforms from the planet Antarea formed an outpost on the planet Earth, on an island known to mankind as the mythical civilization of Atlantis; according to legend, Atlantis sank as the result of an earthquake. Twenty members of the group remained behind in cocoons, to ensure that the rest had sufficient lifeforce to return to their home planet. Eventually a group of four Antareans returns to pick them up. After disguising themselves as humans they rent a house with a swimming pool, which they charge with lifeforce, to give the cocooned Antareans enough energy to survive the trip home. They then rent a boat from a local captain named Jack (Steve Guttenberg), who unknowingly takes them to the location of Atlantis to retrieve their cocoons.
Ben (Wilford Brimley), Arthur (Don Ameche) and Joe (Hume Cronyn), three local residents from a retirement home, go to swim in the pool secretly and take in some of the life force, which causes them to feel younger, stronger, and happier again. They are caught, but are eventually given permission to use the pool by the head Antarean, Walter (Brian Dennehy). Bernie (Jack Gilford), one of the other elderly people from the home well known for his extreme pessimism and who also knows of the nature of the aliens, obstinately refuses to use the healing power that he and his dying spouse need, believing it to be unnatural to extend or interfere with human life in this manner. One night during dinner at the retirement home, he carelessly reveals the secret of the pool's rejuvenating power during a loud confrontation with his "pool" friends. Angry, Joe tries to attack Bernie, but two orderlies intervene; although weakened by cancer before his dip in the pool, Joe is easily able to fight them off. His display of strength and youth encourages the other elderly residents to rush off and break into the Antareans' property, barging their way into the pool. Infuriated, Walter ejects the retirement-home residents, but as too many have been in the pool simultaneously its life force has been drained.
Bernie's wife dies that night and he takes her to the pool, tenderly splashing water over her face in an attempt to revive her, but Walter explains that the power of the pool is gone and that there is nothing he can do to bring Bernie's wife back to life. Walter then explains to the others that none of the cocoons can now survive the trip back to Antarea, but will be able to survive on Earth. With the help of Ben, Arthur and Joe, the Antareans return the cocoons to the ruins of Atlantis, planning to attempt a second rescue in another 10,000 years time. Unable to take the cocoons with them to their home planet, the Antareans offer the space aboard their ship to the old people. Bernie chooses to live out his natural life on Earth, but most of the others accept the invitation to travel to a world where they will never grow ill, never age, and never die.
Read more about this topic: Cocoon (film)
Famous quotes containing the word plot:
“James’s great gift, of course, was his ability to tell a plot in shimmering detail with such delicacy of treatment and such fine aloofness—that is, reluctance to engage in any direct grappling with what, in the play or story, had actually “taken place”Mthat his listeners often did not, in the end, know what had, to put it in another way, “gone on.””
—James Thurber (1894–1961)
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—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“The plot was most interesting. It belonged to no particular age, people, or country, and was perhaps the more delightful on that account, as nobody’s previous information could afford the remotest glimmering of what would ever come of it.”
—Charles Dickens (1812–1870)