The ‘Burbs (1989)

A 1989 American dark comedy directed by Joe Dante and written by Dana Olsen. Tom Hanks plays Ray Peterson, a suburban homeowner on a week of vacation; Bruce Dern, Carrie Fisher, Rick Ducommun, Corey Feldman, Wendy Schaal, and Henry Gibson turn his street into a closed system of suspicion.

what the film does

Ray hears strange sounds coming from the basement of the new Klopek house. He, Art Weingartner, Mark Rumsfield, and teenager Ricky Butler decide the reclusive neighbors must be hiding something terrible. A crushed garbage bag, digging in the backyard, a missing neighbor, and a human femur keep raising the stakes.

The group eventually breaks into the Klopeks’ basement, finds what looks like a crematorium, and digs into the floor. Ray hits a gas line and blows the house up. Then Walter, the supposedly missing neighbor, comes home from the hospital, and Ray has to face the possibility that the men made the entire nightmare out of boredom, fear, and a refusal to mind their own business.

why it’s in the canon

The criteria blend is 1+3, loved it and want to remember it. The ‘Burbs puts a horror movie’s machinery inside a familiar neighborhood and lets the men behave like they have nothing more important to do. Dante has fun with the mystery, but he never lets Ray and his friends off the hook for how quickly they turn gossip into an investigation.

The ensemble is the point. Hanks plays Ray as a man who thinks he wants a quiet week at home, Dern makes Rumsfield’s military confidence into another form of panic, and Ducommun turns Art’s nosiness into a public service he appointed himself to run. The film keeps the line between a real threat and collective self-hypnosis exciting until the last stretch.

what stays with me

The neighbors staring over fences, through garbage, and into each other’s windows. The ‘Burbs understands that a cul-de-sac can become a conspiracy board if everyone has too much time and one dark house at the end of the street.

on hand

DVD.