| *batteries not included | |
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original movie poster by Drew Struzan |
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| Directed by | Matthew Robbins[1] |
| Produced by | Kathleen Kennedy Frank Marshall Steven Spielberg Ronald L. Schwary |
| Screenplay by | Brad Bird Matthew Robbins Brent Maddock S.S. Wilson |
| Story by | Mick Garris |
| Starring | Hume Cronyn Jessica Tandy Frank McRae Elizabeth Peña Michael Carmine Dennis Boutsikaris |
| Music by | James Horner |
| Studio | Amblin Entertainment |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
| Release date(s) | December 18, 1987 |
| Running time | 106 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $25 million (est.)[2] |
| Box office | $65,088,797 |
*batteries not included is a 1987 family-science fiction film directed by Matthew Robbins about small extraterrestrial living machines that save an apartment block under threat from property development.
The story was originally intended to be featured in the TV series Amazing Stories, but Steven Spielberg liked the idea so much that he decided to make it a theatrical release.
Many of the film's foreign releases (including at least Finnish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Latin American Spanish) used the title Miracle on 8th Street in reference to the filming location.
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The film is set in contemporary New York City. Frank and Faye Riley, an elderly couple who run an apartment building and restaurant in the run-down East Village neighborhood, come under threat by a nearby property development. The development manager, Mr. Lacey, sends a hoodlum named Carlos and his gang to bribe the couple and their tenants to move out. When the Rileys refuse to move, Carlos vandalizes the cafe.
Things look bleak until the appearance of a pair of living machines (later titled "The Fix-Its" by Faye) descend into the apartment of the Rileys one evening, restoring the cafe. The two extraterrestrial "Fix-Its" then take up residence in the apartment building and give birth to three baby "Fix-Its". Later, the mechanical family recruit countless other "Fix-Its" for repairs after the apartment building is gutted by an arson fire.
The machines sometimes appear to display emotional reactions. Though their origins remain a mystery, they share some features of von Neumann probes; they are apparently independent of external control, and they have the ability to assimilate scrap metal from various sources to replicate and repair themselves. Early in the movie, Frank insists they are spaceships "from a very small planet...very small." However, in one scene, where Mason examines a "Fix-It" with a magnifying glass, he sees what appear to be micromachines flying through or scuttling across it, implying that there are living beings inside it.
The baby robots are called Wheems, Jetsam and Flotsam. They were created by ILM.
Principal photography started in New York in August 1986, but location scouting began almost a year before. "Since the story called for a solitary building amidst rubble," explained producer Ronald Schwary, "we had to find a vacant lot with burned-out buildings all around it. We finally settled on an actual building on 8th Street between Avenues C and D on New York's Lower East Side (the building no longer stands, and was probably located on the site of the current Housing Bureau substation, or the building to the east)[3]. Production designer Ted Haworth designed a three-sided, four-story tenement facade and oversaw its construction on a location that covered most of a city block. In the name of authenticity, he brought 50 to 60 truckloads of rubble to cover the once vacant lot. It was so remarkably realistic that the Sanitation Department came by and took away prop garbage one morning, potential customers stopped by to eat in the diner, and the business agent for the Plumber's Local of New York visited, demanding to know why there wasn't a permit down at City Hall for the construction." [info from DVD Production Notes]
The final scene before the end credits has an understanding of construction progress that happens around Riley's Café, without it being affected as tall skyscrapers appear, one at a time, around the tiny building. The new buildings used in the shot near the café are from the World Trade Center even though they had already existed for some time by 1987. Street traffic is seen moving as well as people walking on a foot bridge, indicating a filmed shot at the Trade Center area but the pointed black skyscrapers appear to be duplicated optically to contrast with the tiny café. What looks to be the U.S. Steel Building at 1 Liberty Plaza, seems to be the first to appear in the final shot. The scene itself is a non-existent location but the shot appears to be on Trinity Place, facing North with Zuccotti Park, {formerly Liberty Plaza Park} and the U.S. Steel Building both on the lower right.
A gazebo was donated to the Green Oasis and Gilbert's Garden community garden after production was completed.
The movie gained a mostly positive reception.[4][5][6][7]
The movie debuted at #4 at the box office.[8][9]
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