Stand by Me (1986)

You remember the friends. You remember the train tracks. You remember that sick feeling when you realize the narrator isn’t really talking about finding a body—he’s talking about losing a version of his life. Stand by Me makes one childhood adventure feel enormous because we know what the boys don’t: this group isn’t going to stay together forever. That gives it a vicious advantage here. The Sandlot gives you the summer you wish never ended; Stand by Me reminds you that it did. Against American Graffiti, the question becomes almost unfair: which hurts more, leaving childhood behind or leaving home behind? The movie’s entire case is basically one memory you’d give anything to walk back into. Best end-of-summer movie ever, or does it belong more to childhood than summer?