The Burbs

Tom Hanks is probably one of my favourite actors. Not only because he is pretty good at doing all that acting business, but also because he seems like a pretty stand up sort of guy. He isn’t into anything weird like some of those celebrities who are so rich they have forgotten what normal is. The Burbs is pretty old school. You can tell by the DVD transfer, which was like watching a VHS tape after it had been dropped in the sink, even then it started with some mumbo about how brilliantly it had been restored, leaving one wondering quite how bad the original was if this was the best they managed. Its a good film though, about strange goings on in, you guessed it, suburbia. Its a sort of quasi comedic rumination on neighbourhood life. It lambasts everyone to some extent, from the teenager whose parents are out of town, to the bored middle aged man who lives alone, and eats as much of his neighbours food as possible. Really, if you want to get philosophical the film is about what it is to be normal, the ending might feel like a bit of a cop out, but the reality of the film, and I suspect, the reality of the real world, is that there is not really any such thing as normal. This is a pretty noble message for a late 80s comedy about the suburbs. But then, it works because its got Tom Hanks in it, and he is a real nice guy don’t you know.