The Wizard (1989) User Reviews

A Sentimental Favorite

[ReelCheese · 6/10 · 9 September 2006]

THE WIZARD is a sentimental favorite for anyone who raced home after school to turn on their gray and black Nintendo Entertainment Systems. For this set, born in the late '70s and early '80s, the excitement in the air was palpable when previews for the film appeared on TV. It not only combined our two favorite entertainment vehicles -- Nintendo and movies -- but also provided a thrilling sneak preview of the year's most anticipated game, Super Mario Bros. 3. NES geeks (of course they weren't geeks back then... Nintendo was cool) thought they'd died and gone to eight-bit heaven.

When we finally got mom and dad to take us to the theater or pick up the video, THE WIZARD was every bit as good as we'd hoped. Critics almost universally panned it as a 90-minute Nintendo commercial, but young viewers were enthralled. (Besides... a 90-minute Nintendo commercial wasn't exactly an awful thing!). The film combined very human storytelling with hardy laughs and wide-eyed exhilaration. It gave us playground catchphrases (Lucas with "I love the Power Glove. It's so bad" and Jimmy with "Calli-forn-ya... Calli-forn-ya!") Sure the highlight was all the cool video game-related stuff, but video games were a big part of our lives, one that our parents just didn't understand. The people who made this movie, whatever their intentions, did.

Most eight- or nine- or ten-year-olds who caught THE WIZARD upon release would give it two big thumbs up, if not the Oscar for Best Picture of All-Time. Of course we're not eight or nine or ten anymore, and THE WIZARD, in hindsight, is not actually a cinematic masterpiece. But nor is it the sort of mindless junk that stuffy critics would have us believe. The film is actually a sweet, harmless cross-country adventure. It has laughs (who could forget Haley's scream of "He touched my breast!" to ward off the hapless Putnam?) and emotion (Jimmy's reflections of his late sister are undeniably heartbreaking). And the video game competition finale holds up surprisingly well even with the novelty of the Super Mario Bros. 3 footage long worn off.

Beyond that, THE WIZARD carries deeper meanings that children can pick up on. Jimmy, the autistic video game prodigy, demonstrates that all of us, regardless of our limitations, possess marvelous gifts. Putnam, the cold-hearted family services worker trying to take Jimmy away, helps illustrate that families are what matter. And the villainous Lucas is an example of how we should treat our enemies: with dignity and by letting our actions speak louder than our words, as Jimmy does. Okay, it's not exactly Nietzsche, but it's not total fluff, either.

THE WIZARD is not the greatest movie of all-time. It's probably not even a great movie. But it is a special period piece, a reminder of a simpler time when our only worry in the world was passing math and knocking off goombas. It will forever hold a special place in the hearts of many.

Video Game Groms!

[vertigo_14 · 6/10 · 17 March 2004]

The Wizard is one of the best 80s movies for kids or teens. It's got it all--an excellent and hilarious story, great music, excellent actors, and above all--that little 80s console of long hours of entertainment known as The Nintendo.

The Wizard was made to feul sales for Nintendo in promoting it's newest video game, Super Mario Brothers 3, which I understand to be the company's best selling game of all time (and with good reason). The story involves three kids, struggling for independence from their messed up family life. Fred Savage plays Cory, who's father and brother tend to change the subject of the uncomfortable fact that his half-brother Jimmy is going to be put in a foster home. Not if Cory can help it. He and Jimmy go Shanghai for California, the land of possibility. Along the way, they meet Haley, a hot shot young girl who's father is a truck driver and mother is a gambling addict. On her way to Reno, she discovers that Jimmy is a video game wizard (like the Pinball Wizard). With the Video Game Armaggeddon just weeks away, Haley comes up with the idea that the three kids should pool their resources, go to California, compete, and split the cash.

It may seem like an easy goal--heading from Utah to California on a skateboard and a couple of bucks, hustling video game hacks along the way. But meanwhile, a crazy bounty hunter kind of guy has been hired to bring Jimmy (and only Jimmy) back home. He's similarly in a competition--against Corey's father, who needs to get to the kids first before the crazy bounty hunter does.

This movie has it all. You get to see some the greatest Nintendo games (Double Dragon, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) The Adventures of Zelda, Excite Bike, and Rad Racer) in addition to other Nintendo accessories such as The Power Glove ("I love the Power Glove, it's so bad.") It's so effective in selling Nintendo nostalgia (though it wasn't quite nostalgia when the movie was made), that it will make you want to pull out the old console--or emulator--and have a crack or two at some games again.

Additionally, you have an excellent cast of actors involved in a hilarious cat-and-mouse chase, with the most laughs coming from the traveling dispute of the bounty hunter and Corey's dad (Beau Bridges). Plus, how can you go wrong with an early Fred Savage, Jennifer "Rilo Kiley" Lewis, and Christian Slater movie? You can't. It's packed to the brim with excellent features that if you're in love with the 80s, you're sure to enjoy.

Fun Little Flick From My Youth

[Dustbowler · 7/10 · 13 February 2005]

Geez what a goofy but fun movie. As you may know this is the story of a young kid named Jimmy and his brother Corey trying to get to California. They meet up with Haley and she's comes up with the idea of putting Jimmy in the Nintendo Tournament. So it's basically a road flick for kids. You get to see a lot of the video games you grew up with. But that's not all. There are plenty of funny moments. Beau Bridges going nuts with the shovel on Putnam's car is awesome. Well, pretty much ever scene with Beau, Christain Slater or the guy who plays Putnam are worth watching the movie for. With lines like,"Jimmy watch the mushroom!" and,"AAHH he touched my breast!" I dare you not to chuckle. I mean honestly, how can you hate a movie where you get to see Fred Savage punched-out by a girl?

Lucas Barton, American Anti-Hero

[frenzy617 · 3 February 2003]

This movie explores the depths of human emotions. It incorporates dramatic struggles ranging from a family being ripped apart because of a divorce (all too common in this work-a-day society), and a complex friendship being stretched to the limit because of the legendary California Videogame Championship. Corey and Jimmy are half-brothers. Jimmy has a dead twin sister. Mom has a new boyfriend. Dad owns a landscaping business. Throw in Christian Slater as a bad-ass older brother, a love triangle with three 13 year olds, the power-glove, and the song "Send Me and Angel" by Real Life and you have 1 intense peice of cinema. Watch out for cameos by the black dude from Batteries Not Included*, a guy with the same voice as Dicky Barrett, and Las Vegas. I've seen this movie over 3 times, and I still get chills when Corey and Jimmy have to sleep in Goblin Valley. Damn.

The Wizard took a wicked wiz. Its smells, but it's nostalgic as hell. Now you're playing with power

[ironhorse_iv · 6/10 · 25 November 2014]

Welcome to a bad example of Nintendo Propaganda! 8-Bit Nintendo. 2 Bit Script. The Wizard is a lousy movie, but it's a guilty pleasure of mine. Directed by Todd Holland, the movie reminds me of Wonder Years meets 'Rain Man' with Nintendo. The Wizard also known as Joy Stick Heroes, Sweet Road, The Video Game Genius, Game Over and Gameboy in other countries is an adventure comedy-drama film about three children who decide to runaway to California after the death of a family member. The weak main plot is undermined, by the superior sub-plot of one of the children, Jimmy Woods (Luke Edwards), while being emotionally withdrawn, has a useful skill in video games. He's so good, that he's allow to take part of a video game tournament. This 20% part of the film, brings most of the entertaining value; while the other 80% is under par. The whole emotional depth of Jimmy trying to overcome his grief for his sister, is truly not develop, right. That plot is not emotion enough, to care about, and nearly forgotten over the superior entertaining video game sub-plot. The jokes with Jimmy's father, Sam (Beau Bridges) & older brother, Nick (Christian Slater) trying to reach the children, first, between Putnam (Will Seltzer), a greedy and sleazy runaway-child bounty hunter does, is pretty awful and unfunny. Why are both groups sabotaging each other's efforts? Isn't the child well-being more important than this childish badgering? Why is the adults in this film, acting like children, while the children is acting more like adults? Most of the humor are really bad in this film. A young girl loudly accusing the man of molesting her is supposed to be funny? Not funny. Not funny at all. Lots of unrealistic kid movie moments that kinda hurt the film, a bit. How could a 9-year-old boy walk miles along a desert highway without being noticed? I doubt the kids would find enough old rich people playing video games to gambling against. It's not like today, where video games have more appeal to an older generation that lived through video games eras like Atari. Games were pretty mediocre, in graphics and story back then. I doubt many adults played video games at the time. The Wizard is famous for its numerous references to video games and accessories for the Nintendo Entertainment System. The Power Glove is one of those scenes that make the product look amazing; while in truth, the power glove is indeed truly bad. It doesn't even work, most of the time with it hard to control difficulty. Playing the game, Rad Racer on it, isn't easy at all! The film was also well known for the debut of Super Mario Bros. 3. The whole game tournament was indeed tense. Still, it was a bit odd for Jimmy to find a cheap code on a yet to debut game. Honestly, how did he know where to find the warp levels? There were a lot of Inaccuracies BS moments throughout this film. A good example is when Jimmy plays Double Dragon at the bus stop, Corey remarks that Jimmy scored 50,000 points. Jimmy achieved this in less than two minutes of play when in reality it would take playing through nearly the entire game to do so, which would take much more time. Nearly every video game that's played for any length of time in this movie is depicted incorrectly. And this as Product Placement paid for by Nintendo. It is things like this; that would turn off viewers. Still, a lot of old school gamers, would love to revisit this film as it show cast gameplay from Nintendo hits like Castlevania II: Simon's Quest, Contra, Double Dragon, Mega Man 2, Metroid, Ninja Gaiden. It was a bit odd for Nintendo to showcase, some of their really crappy games as well like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Zelda II: the Adventure of Link. As much, as it's nice to see somebody else, play the games well. It's well better to play it yourself. The movie is full of product placement, examples ranges from the family passes by the Cabazon Dinosaurs, a highway tourist attractions to the last part of the film taking place at Universal Studios in California. Large amounts of the time toward the end is use just to showcase extended advertisement for the studio tour. I think that one of the reasons, this movie fails. It felt like a feature length commercial than a movie. The supporting acting in the film was pretty alright at the time. Fred Savage as Jimmy's brother, Corey and Jenny Lewis as Haley were pretty good in their roles. The music by J. Peter Robinson is alright. Overall: This PG-rated 97 minutes, commercial movie has maintains a cult following within the video game culture for good reasons. It's clearly not for the story, but the nostalgia factor of the games that were represented here. So check it out if you want to. Other than that. This movie is game over.

Not just about video games

[Daviteo · 7/10 · 18 January 2019]

If you remove the video game subplot from the equation, you actually come away with a pretty sweet little film about familial relationships after a tragic accident. While watching this again as an adult, instead of through the lens of a kid, I actually saw a fascinating take of the troubled bonds between a father and his "hooligan" teenage son and then also an older brother and younger brother. For something that claims to be about Super Mario Bros., this movie actually has a lot of depth.

Surprisingly holds up rather well.

[Kdosda_Hegen · 6/10 · 10 September 2021]

While it has a few very questionable and weird scenes, a bit of cringe and cheesiness, it also is one of the best films about video games ever made. It not only shows how fun (or addicting) can games be, but also takes a look at the competitive side of gaming. I loved seeing games that I myself have played as a child, though, of course, this is a one big product placement and a commercial for Nintendo but it's done very well that it feels earned, especially with the big reveal of the secret game it feels so iconic even. Some scenes aged extremely ironic like the infamous Power Glove scene. The film also tries to dig into deeper themes too, though, on a few of them it fails, I think it has a surprisingly realistic portrayal of a traumatized kid, but at the same time, it completely fails at father and son themes.

Also, this film is rather similar to Terminator 2 even, it has tons of action scenes, most of them being chase scenes and with its intense music and settings, they do remind me a lot of T-1000 and John Connor chase sequences. And this came before Terminator 2, but I'll take it as a coincidental similarity only.

Overall The Wizard may not be amazing, but it pretty much raises a high standard for movies about video games.

Indescribably Bad.

[slayer_of_the_jugga_phuk · 4/10 · 18 January 2009]

Was there a single positive to this film? Critics who knew nothing of video games could spot the gaming errors made. No damage taken with damage clearly visible towards the beginning being a primary example.

And I may have missed something, but wasn't Super Mario Bros. 3 suppose to be a game that had never played before? Well if that IS the case, and I did not miss anything... how did Fred Savage's character, and even the girl, know so much about the game already? We're talking things that some people don't know about by their second or third play-through.

Beyond the factual and gaming errors there is the general low quality of the film itself. Nothing here is honestly very memorable. The kid wasn't even that good at playing video games in the footage they showed. A lot of kids I knew way back in those days were significantly more experienced. On top of all this the acting and storyline are just mediocre at their strongest points. The characters are bland and completely uninteresting, the 'Wizard' (the youngest child) is a very silent, completely dry child cliché of a little kid who almost never talks because of a trauma. It isn't that this is unrealistic, it's the fact that it had to be thrown into the movie to actually even begin to form a plot that would exceed even 30 minutes.

Honestly, the only value that is to be found here is that of a nostalgic nature. If you grew up with this movie you're going to like it whether it was good or not. It was about kids playing video games, and at the time you saw it you likely had an obsession with the NES as well. But unless you loved it as a kid there just isn't anything that's going to keep you interested, and very little that will prevent you from turning it off.

No sir, I didn't like it.

You got 50,000 on Double Dragon?!?

[mattdvs · 10/10 · 8 August 2001]

If you were born between the years 1974 and 1984 and were as obsessed as most of us were about Nintendo games, you will enjoy this movie. Yes, the plot is predictable and cheesy and the writing leaves a lot to be desired, but I guarantee if you fall into the above group, you will enjoy regressing back to 1989 where having "all 97 games," and "the power glove (it's so bad...)" were major status symbols. If you don't fall into this group, or couldn't really care less about old video games, then you should probably pass on this film. But for the rest of us, (I used to watch the commercial for this film just to get a glimpse at Super Mario Bros. 3) watch it and enjoy it time after time.

And The Gamer Is Born

[view_and_review · 7/10 · 17 February 2020]

This movie was a trip down memory lane. I have the fondest memories of NIntendo and all those games: Zelda, Super Mario Bros., Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Megaman, Metroid, Double Dragon, and others. If I had known then what I know now I may have committed even more time to the videogame craft. Now guys are making millions of dollars playing videogames.

The Wizard in the movie was a nine-year-old boy named Jimmy (Luke Edwards) who earned the nickname by being great at videogames. He behaves like he may be autistic or at least on the spectrum. He comes off like an autistic savant when it comes to videogames.

Jimmy had an insatiable desire to go to California and no one knew why. After Jimmy got placed into a facility that cares for special children his brother Corey (Fred Savage) broke him out so the two of them could go to California. Along the way they run into a girl named Haley (Jenny Lewis) who helps them and convinces them to go to Universal Studios to compete in Video Armageddon, a nationwide videogame competition.

I loved this movie as a kid because who doesn't love videogames? Plus, at that time, Fred Savage was a star. He was in "Wonder Years," he had been in "The Princess Bride," "Vice Versa," and "Little Monsters." You couldn't go wrong casting Fred Savage. The movie wound up being about more than a mere videogame championship, it was a warm movie about family and friends.

The Wizard (1989)

[fntstcplnt · 3/10 · 4 December 2019]

Directed by Todd Holland. Starring Fred Savage, Jenny Lewis, Beau Bridges, Christian Slater, Will Seltzer, Luke Edwards, Jackey Vinson, Wendy Phillips, Sam McMurray, Frank McRae, Steven Grives. (PG)

The year after McDonald's and Coca-Cola teamed up to rip off "E.T." ("Mac and Me"), Nintendo and Universal Studios joined forces to shove a 90-minute commercial down the throats of the youth of America. This advertisement is packaged in a laughably implausible (and kinda unsettling) story of a mentally-handicapped child running away to California, his slightly older brother (Savage) and a vaguely streetwise girl (Lewis) at his side; meanwhile, his mother barely cares enough to hire a sleazy creep of a bounty hunter to track the kid down, and the divorced father hops in a truck to eat donuts and play NES games (oh, and make a halfhearted attempt to find his boys, too). Utterly preposterous from the word "go" (or "Insert Coin"?), good only for the unintentional laughs (don't try to get between Vinson and his Power Glove!); anytime someone decides to "get serious" and talk about their tragic back stories, whip out the Gameboy for a few minutes. Some may decide it's fun to try and spot their favorite 8-bit games or a young, mulleted Tobey Maguire as an extra, but at what price? At what price?

28/100

What can I say? This was My Childhood

[TheOliveBranch · 10/10 · 12 January 2009]

Well, not really. My life story doesn't resemble that of the characters in any way except for our collective love of video games. That said:

I watched this movie so many damn times as a kid it'll make your head spin. What can I say about this movie that you don't already know yourself? Fred Savage. Beau Bridges. Christian Slater. The chick from Rilo Kiley. Spanky.

And then Jimmy brings it all home.

First of all, I want to say that whatever pills the video game contest host was on, I want me some of that. Two, they should bring back the Powerglove. And three, road trip movies will never, ever die.

From Double Dragon to Ninja Gaiden or the nostalgic dinosaur park in the middle of no where, this movie will always remain a classic for me.

"Gimme, gimme, gimme...Jimmy...Woods!!!"

Being a kid when this came out is the only way to enjoy this film

[ensabrenur · 7/10 · 11 July 2005]

Now ill be the first to say that this film is not the best, but when i was young and had bugged my parent to get me a Nintendo i thought it was just great, the Nintendo by todays standards is awful its slow graphics are terrible and the games are dated but god damn it i would love to go back to that time and play them all again i played them so much i could finish most of the games i had all except snake rattle and roll i could never do that last level. But back to the point when the wizard came out i couldn't wait to watch it and to be fair it was what it seemed to be a 90 min advertisement for Nintendo with the story if your good at video games people wont think your slow, well it had me convinced and so fred savage and co went on there little journey and played video games along the way they meet the little git who is the nemesis with his gay ass power glove i never had one but i heard from a reliable resource that they were pants what was good however was the joystick they used in the final game which was the game that we all wanted to play super mario 3 which at the time was the most amazing game around on an 8 bit system

and to make it even more fun they pointed out little tricks you could do in the game before it even came out the magic flute they got in the castle, interesting though that no one had played this game but they knew what everything did but it was a kids film and i was a kid who was captivated by this,

but looking back the film was awful but i can still sit through it and i just cant bear to get rid of it its still got a hold on me in a weird nostalgic way i guess we cant let go of some parts of our childhood

Not Mr. Wizard

[Zepheus · 4/10 · 13 February 2006]

This is a review of The Wizard, not to be confused with The Wiz, or Mr. Wizard. The Wizard is a late-eighties film about a seriously silent boy's ability to play video games and walk during the entire opening credits. The Wiz is an unnecessary update of The Wizard of Oz, and Mr. Wizard is that guy that attached 100 straws together and had some kid drink tang out of it.

Now that we've gotten all that out of the way, let me say this: there's really no reason to see this movie. It's simply a 100 minute Nintendo commercial designed to capitalize on the Powerglove, the Legend of Zelda and Super Mario Brothers 3. I use the word "designed" in the loosest sense possible, because it seems like this movie was written over a weekend by a crack team of people who had never played Nintendo, and directed by a man with less sense of style than my grandmother. Maybe if the writer and director sat down and actually played some games together, they'd realize that they were about to film total rubbish and instead go to vocational school to learn how to install car stereos.

I hope that this has been an enlightening experience for you. It sure hasn't been for me. In fact, I think I might have lost a few braincells in the act of watching this movie and writing about it. Next time you're at the video store and you see the The Wiz, The Wizard and The Wizard of Oz all sitting there on the shelf in a pretty little row, give them all a miss and play Duck Hunt instead.

i love the power glove. it's my mommie.

[jessejace · 18 July 2004]

Somewhere along the line, someone realized that it's nigh impossible to make a good movie based on a video game. So instead, they made a movie about the entire Nintendo Entertainment System, thereby capturing all the feel-good nostalgia associated with its hundreds of titles, but without crippling handicaps such as an unfeasible plot or Jean-Claude VanDamme as Colonel William F. Guile. Thus was born The Wizard...a shameless consumerist repackaging of The Who's Tommy, adjusted for a new audience and coming at you in full-on buddy film fashion. Fred Savage explodes onto the screen as a curly-haired dork with highly articulate eyebrows. He's caught between his divorced parents in a custody battle over his autistic, obsessive-compulsive, equinophobic, dyslexic, colorblind kid brother Jimmy. Realizing that being in the custody of one or more of his parents will most certainly kill Jimmy (and that Jimmy has the superhuman ability to reach level 3 on Double Dragon), Fred Savage does the right thing and whisks his kid brother off to exploit his virtuosic video game playing ability for cash and prizes worth well over $130. Along the way they meet Haley, who's totally hot if you're 12. Haley misleads Fred and Jimmy on many occasions, notably one scene where renegade truckers steal their entire video game pilgrimage budget and presumably, molest them. Still, they stick to their guns (or should I say, their Nintendo LIGHT GUNS, for use with Duck Hunt), even managing to outsmart the enigmatic Lucas, a rebellious young boy who apparently lives alone in the desert like Mohammed. Only this messiah has a Nintendo POWER GLOVE, buy yours today! Lucas complicates the story, creating a sordid love triangle between himself, Fred Savage and Haley. He taunts Jimmy ruthlessly ("We wouldn't want you to...WHIZ on yourself.") and, despite having devoted his life to Nintendo games and thus presumably having no friends, a crowd of prepubescent disciples follow him at all times. His secret to success is the Nintendo Power Glove, which is, in Lucas's own words, "so bad." But as most of us know, the truth is that the Nintendo Power Glove was "totally gay." It only did what you wanted it to do when you were punching your friend in the face with it to vent your frustration about its lack of response. The protagonists' path is beset by peril on all sides. There are teenage white trash hoodlums who exist solely for the purpose of stealing Jimmy's hat and saying lines like "What is this kid, some sort of cyborg?" There are fat salesmen who talk like Foghorn Leghorn, unable to believe that a scrawny kid is better than they are at Contra. And don't get me started on the creepy bald guy hired by Fred's mom to bring the kids back home, dead or alive. His name is Putnam and repeatedly touches Haley's breasts. Meanwhile, Beau Bridges plays Nintendo like my dad, yanking the controller this way and that. Every time Beau Bridges and Christian Slater run into Putnam, a redneck banjo riff kicks in and the whole movie starts to sound like a Menard's commercial while the adversaries engage in automobile/ gardening tool combat. Saved from certain molestation by a grotesque man-child named Spanky, their adventure climaxes when they play Ninja Gaiden with a scary gravel-voiced MC (who also seems to be a child molester) and nearly get eaten by a fake King Kong at UNIVERSAL STUDIOS THEMEPARK, now open! By the way, Jimmy knows the exact location of the Warp Whistle in Super Mario Bros. 3 prior to the game's release because he reads Nintendo Power Magazine. Jimmy gets the warp whistle and uses it to reach World 4 (yes, "Giant World") and Lucas looks on helplessly as his empire of Power Gloves comes crashing down around him. Spackled with golden dialogue, this movie is a subculture in its own right. But while many people quote Lucas's "it's so bad," or Haley's "he touched my breast," for me it doesn't get any better than when Christian Slater says, "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles."

You're a Wizard, Jimmy

[CuriosityKilledShawn · 6/10 · 26 June 2013]

I first saw The Wizard somewhere over Greenland in July 1990. After a long US holiday it was nice seeing a road movie to pass the long hours stuck on the plane. The movie is an utterly shameless 100-minute commercial for Nintendo products, the then imminent release of Super Mario Bros. 3 (even though 2 was never released in the US) and Universal's own Los Angeles theme park, but at the time I was just interested because of all the video games on show, though it does not speak well of youth that even in 1989 video games were still the number 1 sport.

The actual plot woven into the commercial is truly heartbreaking though. Young, possibly autistic, catatonic Jimmy Woods (James Woods?) keeps wandering away from home, desperate to get to California. Half-brother Cory (Fred Savage) goes after him, attempting to pacify his desire to get to the west coast state. Cory thinks that Jimmy wants to enter a video game competition at Universal Studios but really he just wants to visit the Cabazon Dinosaurs - the last place of happy memories before the death of his twin sister, and he just wants to let her go.

Really heavy-going stuff, and not a film I can enjoy watching as an adult in that regard. The film is poorly directed and features innumerable errors regarding the Nintendo products that they are promoting. How can the kids shout out the secrets of a video game that they have never played and that has only just been announced? For a commercial they sure didn't research their material very well. But it does win back some points for effective use of the original "Send me an Angel" by Real Life.

Christian Slater and Beau Bridges pursue the boys as the older brother and dad, while a feisty teenage girl called Hayley helps them get to their destination on time. The travel montages and locations are all memorable and turn the journey into a nice rites-of-passage.

It's become a cult classic in recent years, and will provoke even more nostalgia another 24 years down the line, but the heavy subject matter beneath the Nintendo-plugging means I can't go back again.

Nintendo!

[groundskeepertimmy · 7/10 · 18 December 2004]

If you were a child of the video game explosion that mostly became widely purported by the Nintendo gaming system, then this movie is the flashback that you've been needing. It will cover all the lame stuff that you would look back on and laugh at these days. This movie doesn't really cross over into today's culture, so younger generation beware of this movie. The only reason to find this movie is purely for a time warp. If you can imagine that this movie came out before Super Mario 3, then you can go back in your backlog of memories past and dig up where you were around this period. To me this movie is more of a time capsule. It's got Rad Racer... It's got the Power Glove... What more do you need?

The plot and the acting is lame enough for even the most die hard person to want to lay on the 'fast forward' button on their VCR (since I doubt this will even come on DVD).

Okay, now for a quick outline of the plot.... An autistic kid with amazing gaming skills (for the time) piques the interest of his older brother and a hard luck case girl. Together they plan a cross-country trip that will take them to Universal Studios for the all around best gamers competition.

80's at it's best if you ask me, and a 7 for pure nostalgia!

A fun movie

[NTorok · 7/10 · 8 April 1999]

I found this movie to be very enjoyable, it was never boring and the story is kind of cool. But do not rent this movie if you are expecting a great film, because you will be very disappointed. There are some good performances by a young Christian Slater and others. But all in all this movie is just fun and very cool.

A Commercial Classic

[TrippDigital · 8/10 · 25 February 2005]

A touching drama about a young boy's quest to help his autistic younger brother and a troubled young girl they meet along the way running from her own demons.....

Okay, so it's mostly just a 90 minute commercial for Super Mario Brothers 3, but it's also a great road movie with plenty of classic 80's quotable material ("I love the Power Glove. It's so bad."). It has a good soundtrack as well.

I think if a person sees the film for the first time nowadays they might not enjoy it as much as those who saw the film growing up and enjoy that oh so good feeling of nostalgia.

The greatest infomercial ever made! (minor spoilers) I love "The Wizard"... it's so bad...

[Mulliga · 7/10 · 16 July 2003]

Wow. Product placement, baby.

This movie must hold some kind of all-time record for most instances of product placement in a movie. If you like Nintendo, you'll be in awe here. Mattel's Power Glove, the Nintendo hints hotline, and dozens upon dozens of late 80's NES games on the screen - Double Dragon, Metroid, Mega Man 2, Super Mario Bros. 2, etc.

The crown jewel was Super Mario Bros. 3 (quite possibly the best 2D platform game ever made).

The dialogue is often horrifically, unintentionally funny.

"Calee-fornee-uh!"

"You got 50,000 on Double Dragon?"

"I love the Power Glove...it's so bad."

"AHHHH! He touched my breast!"

When Jimmy beats Lucas, he finds a warp whistle in an area that you couldn't POSSIBLY know about without reading a guide/talking to someone who's played it (the first Bam-Bam fortress), leading me to believe the way to win in life is to cheat :-0. The eventual reasoning for going to California is logical.

That all said, the movie has A LOT of nostalgic charm, decent acting (they're all child actors, so cut them some slack!), and a breezy story. Sure we never really know WHY three kids can hitch-hike for two weeks across the Utah desert without getting murdered or raped, but hey, it's just a movie after all. I've seen movies that are boring, I've seen commercials that are entertaining, but somehow, this commercial/movie is intriguing.

4 to 10 out of 10, depending on how much you like the NES.

The Wizard...it's so bad. No really, it sucks.

[Aaron1375 · 2/10 · 24 May 2020]

A score over six, are you kidding me!?! This is one of the most boring films I have ever watched and I am so glad I watched this film as an adult with the help of rifftrax because I have always been morbidly curious about it. The number one take away from this movie is that the makers of this film had very little knowledge of how games work, nor did the older actors. Two, girls were not playing Nintendo back then, when it was big the boys were playing it and most of the girls were rolling their eyes thinking it was stupid. There may have been a few here and there, but nowhere near enough to fill up a Nintendo competition so it looks like it is 50/50. I guess Hollywood was trying to make it out like girls liked stuff even back then that was primarily a boy thing just as they do Star Wars and comic films these days. Always wanting to undercut the fact video games, Star Wars and comics were built by boys. Once again, not saying girls do not like that stuff as they do like these things now, but it was almost all boys back in my time.

So, the story, a boy suffering from being a bit different is walking down the highway, he wants to get to California and his mother and father and other father who has two sons do not know why. Seriously, their family tree is a bit all over the place and quite frankly the fact his twin sister died just may be the reason for his problems. Well, still unsure why, but Fred Savage, the one person that may or may not be little Jimmy's brother takes Jimmy on a cross country adventure where they are robbed, beaten down and pursued by a bounty hunter who tracks children. During this trip Fred or Corey as he is referred to in the film, learns his brother can score 50,000 in Double Dragon in a matter of five minutes which is impossible as you cannot make that character go any faster and a girl ends up joining them as we need a love interest in a children's film and someone who can yell, "He touched my breasts!" which is really appropriate for a film aimed at kids. They decide to go to a video game competition, but have to go to Reno first for backstory and whatnot.

Once again, the makers of this film did not know squat about video games and quite frankly, it shows and takes the film down a peg, not that it is any good to begin with. The climatic finish they are playing Super Mario 3 and the girl keeps shouting to Jimmy to do this and that, but at this point this game was not released and this was its debut, how the heck does she know what to do? Then there is this kid named Lucas who is also really good at games because he has a whole lot of them and lives on an airfield. He seems like the real wizard of gaming as he is actually able to use the Powerglove effectively! Then there is nerdy girl who also qualifies cause I guess they had to put a girl in there and she and Lucas show such animosity towards each other it almost feels there should be a backstory between the two. Meanwhile, if they were realistic at all most of the competitors would be in their early 20s as they were the ones frequenting arcades and such and actually achieving those high scores, I mean Jimmy got killed twice in rather easy levels.

So, this film is just an advertisement with an overly complicated family tree and circumstances added on to pad the film which was over padded as it kept going and going and going. I did not see the need for the final confrontation with the bounty hunter and running through Universal Studios as we had two near captures and escapes at that point. The adults at the contest seemed like they would be hosting like a cocaine snorting contest and the film tries to convince us that girls too play Nintendo, which they do, but not the number they were showing (though notice how they made the finalist a nerdy looking girl). All this because no one could figure out why Jimmy was upset even though by the picture he showed of the family at the end their family was whole like a month previous as Jimmy and Corey were the exact same ages in the photo as they were during the film. Seriously, that was the best story you could come up with to get kids to a video game championship? I always figured this movie was horrid from the previews and I was right. If you enjoyed it, good for you, your nostalgia is painting a pretty picture for you as you gasped the first time you saw Super Mario 3 unveiled. I was more into Zelda myself.

One of my favorite movies.

[jsilvert · 8/10 · 2 October 1999]

I can't remember the first time I saw this movie... but I have now seen it about 5 times, all though the last time had to be about 5 years ago.

This is one of my favorite movies. I remember just sitting there when I was younger, and my attention was never lost in it. Thinking back on it now, I realize that the whole movie was just a 2 hour commercial to promote the soon-to-be released Super Nintendo... but I don't care!

It was a great story, and I wouldn't mind seeing it again.

good kids adventure despite the danger and Nintendo commercial

[SnoopyStyle · 6/10 · 3 May 2015]

Jimmy Woods (Luke Edwards) suffers from unspecified mental handicap and often wanders off to go to California. He lives with his mother Christine Bateman and stepfather. The stepfather institutionalizes him in a home. Corey (Fred Savage) and Nick (Christian Slater) live with their father Sam Woods (Beau Bridges). There is little that Sam can do without custody. Corey takes his half-brother Jimmy away from the home on a trip to California. Bateman hires Putnam (Will Seltzer) to track down Jimmy while Sam and Nick follow the boys on their own. While at a bus station, they meet Haley Brooks (Jenny Lewis) and discover that Jimmy is a real wizard at video games. Haley suggests entering him in a big video game contest in L.A.

This is a fun little adventure for kids. Of course, it's insanely dangerous to promote hitchhiking for little kids and it's a thinly disguised commercial for Nintendo. Nevertheless, Lewis and Savage are cute together. The power glove sounded awesome. The B story has some fun comedy. Beau Bridges getting hooked on video games is funny. If not for 3 little kids hitchhiking around in what essentially is a commercial, I would be more fully behind this movie.

It's like The Last Dragon

[jeffreygunn · 3/10 · 1 July 2019]

For those of you who gave this movie a rating above 3 stars please pretend that you hadn't seen this until you're an adult, then re-rate it properly. I liked The Last Dragon when I was a kid, but now know it's a pile of excrement just as this movie is. I suppose kids are easier to brain-wash though so I shouldn't be too cruel.

The Wizard is still a heap of crap however, that fact is not changed.

Love Nintendo, and (sorry) love this movie

[EddieMink · 3 September 2002]

The fond memories I had of this flick from my youth were not disappointed when I finally caught up with it again recently.

Its simply a great kids adventure. Many claimed at the time that it was little more than a rather enormous advert for Nintendo, and it is. But they bothered to make a decent movie out of it as well. I remember how excited I was at the prospect of Super Mario Bros 3, and this movie plays up to those expectations very entertainingly.

If you love videogames, the film is a fascinating cultural artifact. If you are a youngster, you should thoroughly enjoy a very well maintained adventure, with surprisingly few flaws.

It may sound pretentious, but for what it is, it is near flawless. Go figure!