Reception and Home Video Release
The film did not do well at the box office, although it did better in video rentals and DVD sales and garnered positive reception from critics. Over time, it has gained a cult following among fans of Dante's work, as well as science fiction fans and those who feel it is an overall family friendly movie. It currently holds a 78% positive rank (out of 18 reviews) and a 6.1 rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
VHS and DVD releases would be recut to remove two scenes, where Wolfgang has an encounter with Steve Jackson's gang of bullies and a brief bit where the boys chase the Tilt-a-Whirl ride after they push it up a hill. However, it does restore a brief sequence at the end where Ben daydreams about the Thunder Road ship restored and in the classroom. Originally before the end credits, in the theatrical cut, the alien Wak "broke the fourth wall" and remarked how he knows people are still out there due to the popcorn smell. In the reedited home video version, he just tells another joke before it cuts to the closing credits.
Read more about this topic: Explorers (film)
Famous quotes containing the words reception, home, video and/or release:
“He’s leaving Germany by special request of the Nazi government. First he sends a dispatch about Danzig and how 10,000 German tourists are pouring into the city every day with butterfly nets in their hands and submachine guns in their knapsacks. They warn him right then. What does he do next? Goes to a reception at von Ribbentropf’s and keeps yelling for gefilte fish!”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)
“Chinese were born ... with an accumulated wisdom, a natural sophistication, an intelligent naivete, and unless they were transplanted too young, these qualities ripened in them.... If ever I am homesick for China, now that I am home in my own country, it is when I discover here no philosophy. Our people have opinions and creeds and prejudices and ideas but as yet no philosophy.”
—Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973)
“We attempt to remember our collective American childhood, the way it was, but what we often remember is a combination of real past, pieces reshaped by bitterness and love, and, of course, the video past—the portrayals of family life on such television programs as “Leave it to Beaver” and “Father Knows Best” and all the rest.”
—Richard Louv (20th century)
“The steel decks rock with the lightning shock, and shake with the
great recoil,
And the sea grows red with the blood of the dead and reaches for his spoil—
But not till the foe has gone below or turns his prow and runs,
Shall the voice of peace bring sweet release to the men behind the
guns!”
—John Jerome Rooney (1866–1934)