Joseph Ruben’s “The Good Son” (1993) offers us combined emotions proper from the beginning.

The opening credit’ font and Elmer Bernstein’s rating recommend a young household drama, akin to “My Girl” (1992), each of which star Macauley Culkin. The twist is that, whereas Culkin grew to become an enormous star from the PG-rated mega-blockbuster “Home Alone” (1990), and “My Girl” is greatest remembered for the surprising tragedy surrounding his onscreen character, “The Good Son” was one thing else altogether.

Ruben’s Movie was well-known for positioning Culkin, among the many largest and youngest film stars on this planet, within the lead of an R-rated psychological thriller the place he would play a 1990’s variant on “The Omen” (1976).

Understandably, numerous children attended the movie’s opening weekend and had been horrified that their star was murdering folks on display, versus establishing wacky/ghastly traps for the deserving Moist Bandits.

Movie periodicals reported that Culkin was receiving an enormous paycheck to star in “The Good Son,” but additionally that the movie was part of household deal making, because the star’s father wouldn’t enable his son to make one other industrial automobile (the second “Home Alone”) with out stretching in a non-comic position.

Therefore, right here’s Culkin, performing alongside Elijah Wooden and failing to maintain the would-be Hobbit from stealing his large dramatic film from him.

Wooden performs Mike, whose mom has handed and is distributed to stick with his cousin Henry (Culkin), who wants a pal and a accomplice for the havoc he’s about to unleash on his family.

Even the poster felt like a nasty name, with a good image of a smiling Culkin, below a tagline that learn “Evil Has Many Faces.” Informing your viewers that you simply’re not supposed to love essentially the most endearing youngster star of his technology appeared like a stretch.

The Good Son. This film traumatized me as a child as a result of I beloved Macaulay Culkin after Dwelling Alone. Plus it’s not like he’s supernatural evil, he’s simply common individual evil in a child. pic.twitter.com/LsWcrne6di

— Shoshana Kessock (@ShoshanaKessock) June 1, 2023

Culkin’s introductory scene, the place he emerges carrying a masks not misplaced in David Lynch’s “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me” (1992), poses an issue; is he too cute to be enjoying such an evil character or is the character too evil for an actor so cute?

Coming solely a 12 months after “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York” (1992), this far-too-early profession stretch for Culkin fascinates in its unsteady makes an attempt to embrace the darkness of the story.

Wooden carries the movie, and the premise is lean and direct sufficient to supply for entertaining trash. The issue is that it’s Wooden who supplies the movie’s heart, and never Culkin’s look-how-bad-I-am flip, that powers the film.

Culkin’s self-aware line readings had been humorous in “Uncle Buck” (1989) and “Home Alone” however come throughout as amateurish right here. Maybe he and Wooden ought to have swapped roles. Culkin has some good moments, however his self-conscious performing is a stark distinction to the at all times plausible Wooden.

Ruben is an efficient director, however he nailed this type of materials in “The Stepfather” (1987), which additionally sported a perversely riveting idea (based mostly on a horrific true story) and was anchored by Terry O’Quinn’s unforgettable efficiency.

Too mild for horror film followers and too sick for kids, “The Good Son” has not one of the chew of the Damien Thorn movies (any of them) and may’t maintain a candle to latter like “Joshua” (2007), the perfect model of this style of film.

Macaulay Culkin and Elijah Wooden on the set of the film The Good Son. 1993 [1200×941] pic.twitter.com/HstPixXPXt

— Historyland (@HistoryIand) August 22, 2023

“The Bad Seed” (1956) is cited as a key on this subgenre, however Ruben’s movie needs to go all-in and embrace the insanity of “Bloody Birthday” (1981) and “The Children” (1980) however retains pulling again.

There’s social commentary and parental reflection to gauge inside a lot of these films, however the story’s twisted potential is softened by an excessively secure method.

It’s a bizarre expertise watching “The Good Son,” in that we would like the movie to get a lot gnarlier however cringe every time the movie is merciless sufficient to recommend that Kevin McCalister would stoop to killing a canine for enjoyable.

The screenplay is by Ian McEwan and certain would have performed higher with out the stunt casting. McEwan’s novel, “The Comfort of Strangers,” grew to become a jolting Christopher Walken-led 1990 Paul Schrader drama.

I had an particularly unusual expertise seeing “The Good Son” in a theater on opening evening.

It was enjoying on a number of screens and the usher by accident despatched my father, brother and I right into a sold-out theater the place there have been nearly no seats left and the movie was 20 minutes from ending.

The three of us sat down, bought to listen to the lovely younger star declare “Don’t f— with me” to a theater filled with gasps and, only a few scenes later, the film was over.

We realized what had occurred, and my dad organized for us to see the movie from the start. But, seeing the movie in its entirety was nearly precisely like watching the extraordinarily truncated model: we’re there to observe Culkin majorly misbehave and do actually dangerous issues, then the film is over.

The perverse attraction of the movie was current in both expertise.

Within the ultimate scene, a mom makes a alternative that permits for a feel-good voice over earlier than the top credit. Had the mom made the trickier, extra dramatically richer alternative of selecting to save lots of a unique child, it might have made for a darker, extra thought-provoking conclusion.

Every little thing about “The Good Son” is like that – as ugly as this will get, it barely earns its R-rating and comfortable peddles a narrative that wanted filmmakers unafraid of whom was enjoying the very dangerous seed.