Cocoon: The Return

"Journey to the most wonderful place in the universe... home."

1988 1h 56m EN

😐

6.5

MID

🥫

31%

ROTTEN

😬

METACRITIC

⭐

5.4

IMDB

★6.5TMDB · 1,043🥫31%Rotten Tomatoes●45Metacritic★5.4IMDB · 18,181

ComedyScience Fiction

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

The reinvigorated elderly group that left Earth comes back to visit their relatives. Will they all decide to go back to the planet where no one grows old, or will they be tempted to remain on Earth?

“Journey to the most wonderful place in the universe... home.”

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Cast

Don Ameche
Art Selwyn
Wilford Brimley
Ben Luckett
Courteney Cox
Sara
Hume Cronyn
Joe Finley
Jack Gilford
Bernie Lefkowitz
Steve Guttenberg
Jack Bonner
Barret Oliver
David
Maureen Stapleton
Mary Luckett

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Daniel Petrie
Writers: Stephen McPherson, David Saperstein
Languages: English
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

ERA

Did you know

38 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

CINEMA

Did you know

Part of the "Cocoon Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Daniel Petrie, shot by Tak Fujimoto. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by James Horner. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Mark Warner shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Don Ameche and Wilford Brimley and Courteney Cox carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

AWARDS

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "Journey to the most wonderful place in the universe... home.".

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0094890 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Daniel Petrie directs. Tak Fujimoto behind the camera. James Horner scores. Mark Warner cuts. Profitable at the box office. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

138 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
2Part of the "Cocoon Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.
3Directed by Daniel Petrie, shot by Tak Fujimoto. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
4Original score by James Horner. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
5Editor Mark Warner shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
6Don Ameche and Wilford Brimley and Courteney Cox carry the top of the cast.
7Marketing tagline: "Journey to the most wonderful place in the universe... home.".
8IMDB entry: tt0094890 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
9Classified under 15 themes, including "return", "pregnancy", "shape shifting alien", "pregnant woman".

The technical file

Cinematography: Tak Fujimoto
Original score: James Horner
Editing: Mark Warner
Makeup / hair: Ve Neill
Sound: Gary Summers
Runtime: 116 min · 1h 56m
Status: Released
Budget: $17,500,000
Box office: $25,000,000
Return: 143% of budget
Original language: EN
Certification (US): PG
IMDB: Cocoon: The Return (1988)
Rotten Tomatoes: 31% 🥫 Rotten
Metacritic: 45/100
IMDB rating: 5.4/10 · 18,181 votes
MPAA: PG

Awards

4 nominations total

Part of

Cocoon Collection

Cocoon is a 1985 American science fiction fantasy comedy-drama film directed by Ron Howard about a group of elderly people rejuvenated by aliens. The movie stars Don Ameche, Wilford Brimley, Hume Cronyn, Brian Dennehy, Jack Gilford, Steve Guttenberg, Maureen Stapleton, Jessica Tandy, Gwen Verdon, Herta Ware, Tahnee Welch, and Linda Harrison. The film is loosely based on the novel of the same name by David Saperstein. A sequel, Cocoon: The Return, was released in 1988 in which almost all of the original cast reprised their roles.

Also by

Daniel Petrie

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

Filipe Manuel Neto2023-02-14
★ 3/10
Lazy, laying in the shadow of the original film, doesn't have much merit in itself. Daniel Petrie decided to take a film that was successful and acquired a certain affection and make a poor sequel. I think almost everyone knows that a sequel to a good movie is almost never as good as the original movie... it could be a cliché, but the truth is that it is something so common that it has become something to watch. Besides, for studios, it's a good way to make money without considerable effort or a big capital draw. What this film offers us is, in short, more of the same, but without any charm. The film leans against the shadow of the predecessor's success and peacefully slumbers in the belief that we will like it because we liked the first film. It didn't work for me. The only thing that makes this movie really worthwhile is the fact that it reunites most of its predecessor's cast. It's worth seeing some of the shenanigans of Don Ameche, Wilford Brimey, Maureen Stapleton and Jack Gilford. You can tell they're having a lot of fun with the project, and that the film, even if it's not brilliant, allowed them to revisit characters they enjoyed playing. The movie works reasonably well thanks to this, and the older cast almost have their own separate sub-plot, but the movie loses out by not going beyond that, thanks to a rather weak script. Steve Guttenberg, for example, is even more uninteresting here than he was in the original film, which is really something relevant. Technically, the film doesn't make any major mistakes or flaws, but it isn't particularly brilliant.

Production companies