Original subtitles

? What would you do if I sang out of tune? ?

? Would you stand up and walk out on me? ?

? Lend me your ears, and I'll sing you a song ?

? I will try not to sing out of key, yeah ?

? Oh, baby, I get by ? ? By with a little help from my friends ?

? All I need is my buddies ?

? High with a little help from my friends ?

? I'm sayin' I'm gonna get higher ? -? Try with a little help from my friends ?

- ? Whoa-oa-oa-oa, yeah ? - ? Ooh, ooh, ooh ?

[ The Byrds' "Turn! Turn! Turn!" plays ]

1968. I was 12 years old.

A lot happened that year.

Denny McLain won 31 games, "the Mod Squad" hit the air,

And I graduated from Hillcrest Elementary

And entered junior high school.

But we'll get to that.

? A time to be born, a time to die ?

? A time to plant, a time to reap ?

There's no pretty way to put this.

I grew up in the suburbs.

I guess most people think of the suburbs

As a place with all the disadvantages of the city

And none of the advantages of the country...

And vice versa.

? To everything... ?

But, in a way, those really were the wonder years

For us there in the suburbs.

It was kind of a golden age for kids.

? And a time to every purpose... ?

There, that's me... Kevin Arnold, 1968,

The summer before junior high school.

There we go.

And I don't mind saying I was a pretty fair little athlete.

[ girls chuckle ]

It was a pretty hard pass.

Well, uh, yeah.

I-I think it had sort of a... Reverse spin on it.

Come on, Kevin.

Stop gabbing with your girlfriend.

She's not my girlfriend.

This was true.

Winnie Cooper was not my girlfriend.

When we were very little, we used to go

Down to Harper's Woods and catch fireflies,

But we really hadn't hung out at all together

Since we were about 9.

Uhoh. I think girlfriend's mad at you.

Maybe you'd better go give her a big French kiss.

Shut up, Wayne.

Hey, girls, come on over here.

Kevin's gonna show you what a French kiss is. [ Chuckles ]

Buttface.

What did you say?

Nothing.

This is the way

Most of my conversations with my brother, Wayne, ended.

Apparently, he just deeply regretted

The fact that I had been born,

And he wanted me to feel the same way.

Come on, Wayne! Let him up!

I'm sorry, Paul. This is a family matter.

That was my best friend, Paul Pfeiffer.

Paul was allergic to everything.

Wayne used to say he was even allergic to his own snot.

Wayne was a really funny guy.

Hey, Wayne!

Knock it off before I do the same thing to you!

Winnie's brother, Brian Cooper.

He was 19, and for us, he defined "cool."

He had this really great '59 El Camino.

Didn't run, of course,

But he was always out there workin' on it,

Sweaty, grease all over his hands.

What a guy.

That June he got drafted and packed off to Vietnam.

But his car was still out front, up on blocks,

As kind of a reminder

Of who really ran things on our street.

[ coughing ]

Mom, can Paul stay for dinner?!

Sure, if his Mom knows!

What are you having?

What are we having?!

Meat loaf!

I'm allergic to it.

What else?!

Salad!

[ Helicopter blades whirring ]

And more heavy fighting in the Mekong Delta today.

Marines and South Vietnamese troops

Occupied and then destroyed several guerrilla strongholds.

When's Dad coming home?

Any minute.

Between the traffic and his job,

He's liable to be very tense,

So let's not make him crazy.

He's always tense.

That's true.

He's always tense, but he's not crazy yet.

So, let's try to maintain that sense of equilibrium.

[ Dog barking in distance ]

Hi, hon. How's traffic?

Traffic's traffic.

Dad had a Spartan sense of language.

Karen, honey, you said

You were gonna come home early and help me with dinner.

Peace, Mom, okay?

Peace is fine,

But you said you were gonna help me with dinner.

You have so much bad karma in your life.

You know that, ma? I'd be careful if I were you.

Thank you. I'll keep an eye out.

In the meantime,

When your father gets back, try not to make him crazy.

[ Sighs ]

[ Sighs ]

Hi, Paul.

Dad always said "hi" to our friends,

But it was like he had this understanding with the family.

He worked hard for us, he provided for us,

And he certainly didn't want to have to talk to us

On top of that.

My approach was to not make any sudden moves or sounds

Until he'd finished that first vodka tonic

And hope that nobody else did anything

That might upset him too much before then.

I'm gonna get some birth-control pills.

I thought you should know.

[ Kettle whistles ]

Tell me I didn't hear what I just heard!

Tell your father that you were joking.

[ All talking at once ]

And that's pretty much the way that summer went.

I guess it was really my last summer

Of pure, unadulterated childhood.

? I've looked at life from both sides now ?

? From up and down, and still somehow ?

? It's life's illusions I recall ?

? I really don't know life ?

? At all ?

[ Tommy James and the Shondelles' "Crystal Blue Persuasion" plays ]

This was it... the last night of summer.

Holy cow!

Try not to drool on it, okay?

If Karen finds out I have this, she'll kill me.

Paul and I decided

That the best way to prepare for junior-high-school girls

Was to look at them naked.

[ knock on door ]

Paul, your mother called.

She wants you to come home right away. -Okay.

? Better get ready ?

? Gonna see the light ?

Well, I guess I'll see you at the bus stop.

Yeah.

? Love is the answer ?

Last night I had a dream

That when I got to school, I realized I had no clothes on.

If you're naked when you get to the bus stop,

I'll tell you.

Thanks.

Do you know what you're gonna wear?

Paul, I have no idea.

Actually, I'd been planning my wardrobe for about six weeks.

[ footsteps approach ]

[ Gunfire ]

You're not gonna wear that to school, are you?

No, Mom. I got a job as a male model.

[ laughing ]

Don't worry about it. You look fine.

Let me see our class schedule one more time.

No!

He was gonna have to get a grip on himself.

This was the junior-high bus stop,

And if we were gonna hold our own with the older kids,

We were gonna have to act mature.

Mnh! Mnh-mnh!

We seemed to have something of a height disadvantage,

But we did our best to fit in.

[ muffled ] who's that?

[ Muffled ] huh?

What an incredible stroke of luck...

A new kid, a helpless waif

Who would be even more lost than we were,

A helpless waif in fishnet tights and go-go boots.

Hi, Kevin. Hi, Paul.

Winnie Cooper?!

Gwendolyn.

I don't want to be called "Winnie" anymore.

My real name is Gwendolyn.

Well, there was no question now.

We were entering uncharted territory.

Even the familiar was cloaked in the vestments of the devil.

Junior high school was a whole new ball of wax.

Like about half the schools in the country that year,

My school was being renamed Robert F. Kennedy Junior High.

As we approached those doors for the first time,

We felt we were approaching the portals of manhood.

Homeroom.

I sat between Eric Antonio and Gail Aslaynian.

They had met on the bus

And had taken a liking to each other.

I love you.

I love you, too.

And I-I love you both,

But I'm having a little trouble breathing here.

I was about to have my first sexual experience.

And I wasn't even one of the principal players.

Kevin Arnold.

You're Wayne's brother, aren't you?

Well... well, according to my mother, yes,

But my own theory is...

You've got a tough row to hoe, young man...

A tough row to hoe.

Yes.

First major accessory of adulthood... our own lockers.

I couldn't believe my good fortune.

Two lockers down from mine was Debbie Ackerman,

One of the prime knockouts of the 7th grade.

There was only one problem.

Charles Manson had the locker between us.

A 7th-grader with a beard?

This wasn't junior high school. It was a freak show.

I hoped none of the girls would have beards.

What's your locker combination?

Well, I, uh...

I appreciate your asking, but, actually, they told us

We weren't supposed to tell anyone El...

Here you go.

Anybody finds out about these...

And I know who told 'em.

Who?

It was my only shot.

I thought maybe I could trick him.

You! You! That's who!

Oh, right.

[ School bell rings ]

In one of those quirks of scheduling,

My first class was gym.

This meant that I had to wake up in the morning,

Shower, get dressed, go to school,

Get undressed, run around, shower, and get dressed

All in the space of about 45 minutes.

Well, people.

A lot of you probably think this is gym class, huh?

I was overwhelmed by a sudden panic.

Things hadn't been going that well so far,

But if this wasn't gym class,

I was in bigger trouble than I thought.

Well, it's not.

People, it's physical education class.

Through those doors, they educate your minds.

In here... I educate your bodies.

I'm an educator, okay?

A body educator.

Of course, we didn't realize it at the time,

But this guy had the biggest inferiority complex

Since napoleon.

People, when you leave this class,

You're gonna have smart bodies...

Smart... Smart bodies.

He went on educating our bodies

For about half an hour.

By the time he finished,

I was ready to let my leg take a math test.

One more thing, people, before you do your laps.

The jockstrap.

"A," what is it,

And, "b," what can it do for you?

Arnold.

This was it.

I felt like a fighter pilot under heavy enemy fire.

[ clears throat ]

[ Sighs ]

Well, the jockstrap...

Sir...

Is a particular... Type of strap

That's constructed

Of a strap-type material

Which is utilized exclusively

For the purposes... Of...

Jocks.

[ Jet engines roar ]

[ Explosion ]

Lunch...

At last, something I figured even I couldn't screw up.

Where do you want to sit?

Anywhere. Let's just sit here.

A suburban junior-high-school cafeteria

Is like a microcosm of the world.

The goal is to protect yourself,

And safety comes in groups.

You have your cool kids...

You have your smart kids...

You have your greasers...

And in those days, of course, you had your hippies.

Right on!

In effect, in junior high school,

Who you are is defined less by who you are

Than by who's the person sitting next to you.

[ slurps ]

A sobering thought.

Try to look like you're having fun.

Hi.

Do you guys mind if I sit with you?

Sure, Winnie.

We were on our way. Our group was forming.

And Winnie... I mean Gwendolyn...

Was not chopped liver.

Who knows?

Maybe we even had an outside chance

To become the cool 7th-grade group

If we could just remain inconspicuous

Until we picked up a few more members.

[ mockingly ] hey, Steve!

It looks like my baby brother and his girlfriend

Have found each other.

[ Chuckles ]

She's not my girlfriend.

He thinks you are so-o-o cute.

I don't think she's cute.

He wants to give you a big... Wet...

Kiss.

[ Smooches loudly ]

[ Chuckles ] he told me.

You liar. I never said that!

I don't want to kiss her! I don't even like her!

Young man.

[ Knocks on glass ] what does that sign say?

Hmm?

You take that apple through that door,

And you're asking for detention.

Young man!

I think we have a problem.

He was right... there was a problem.

Oh, yeah. The apple.

That's right. The apple.

You wanted it inside the cafeteria.

That's right.

And now it's outside the cafeteria.

That's right.

The conversation was getting stale.

I asked myself,

"now, what would a guy like Brian Cooper do

In this situation?"

[ girl screams ]

[ Tableware clatters ]

Um...

Uh...

If... if you want, I could, uh...

I could...

Get that.

Well, Kevin,

Perhaps we should start by asking you to explain

What in God's name moved you to do what you did.

I wanted to tell them that Wayne had embarrassed me,

That the other kids were laughing,

That Mr. Diperna had played power games with me,

That Winnie had seen the whole thing

And that she'd been wearing pink fishnets and go-go boots.

I don't know.

"I don't know"? That's all you have to say?

"I don't know"?

Kevin...

The question is, what did you hope to achieve

By throwing an apple into a cafeteria?

[ Thinking ] no, butthead.

The question is,

Why do you have a brain the size of a baby pea?

Kevin, Mr. Diperna just asked you a question.

What did you hope to achieve

By throwing that apple into the cafeteria?

[ Thinking ] world peace.

Kevin!

Nothing.

Well, Kevin, that's exactly what you did achieve...

Nothing.

Now, I'm going to let you go

Without any further punishment.

But I want you to know

That I'll be keeping my eye on you.

Do you understand that?

[ Sighs ]

Kevin, do you understand that?

Yes.

I'd like to take him home now.

[ Knuckles crack ]

In my 121/2 years, my father had never struck me,

But he'd given Wayne a beating... twice...

And I recognized that glazed look in his eyes.

Besides, maybe I deserved it.

There really is no good excuse

For hurling food around the cafeteria.

He probably figured that if he laid down the law now,

I'd stay in line, and he was probably right.

Anyway, I could take the pain.

I decided I'd just shut my eyes and imagine it was Wayne.

Come on. Inside.

And then it happened.

I think we were about halfway to the front porch.

Brian Cooper was killed.

Oh, my God.

When did they find out?

[ Voice breaking ] I'm gonna go call Evelyn

And see if there's anything I can do.

Oh, my God. Poor Evelyn. Poor Jim.

That night, I decided to go for a walk.

The days were still long, and back then,

Kids could still go for walks at dusk

Without the fear of ending up on a milk carton.

I went down to the big climbing tree in Harper's Woods.

I didn't admit it to myself until years later,

But in my mind was the shadow of a thought

That Winnie might be there.

She was sort of hugging herself

And rocking slowly back and forth.

There was a bit of a chill in the air,

And she didn't have a sweater.

For a minute, I was scared to approach her.

I didn't know what to say. I had the strangest feeling.

It was impossible for me to believe.

Brian was dead.

I'm sorry.

About Brian.

And I'm sorry...

About what I said today.

It wasn't true.

I know.

[ Sighs ]

[ Crickets chirping ]

[ Percy Sledge's "When a Man Loves a Woman" plays ]

? When a man loves a woman ?

? Can't keep his mind on nothing else ?

It was the first kiss for both of us.

We never really talked about it afterward.

But I think about the events of that day again and again,

And somehow I know that Winnie does, too,

Whenever some blowhard starts talking

About the anonymity of the suburbs

Or the mindlessness of the TV generation,

Because we know

That inside each one of those identical boxes,

With its dodge parked out front

And its white bread on the table

And its TV set glowing blue in the falling dusk,

There were people with stories.

There were families bound together

In the pain and the struggle of love.

There were moments that made us cry with laughter,

And there were moments, like that one, of sorrow and wonder.

? Well, this man loves you, woman ?

Repair and Synchronization by Easy Subtitles Synchronizer 1.0.0.0