The Movies I Grew Up On Are Gone. And I Miss Them.

Last night, I sat in a dark AMC theater surrounded by families, teens, and a few fellow nostalgia junkies, watching Casper on the big screen for its 30th anniversary. Yes—Casper. The friendly ghost. Bill Pullman’s perfectly rumpled dad energy. Devon Sawa’s heart-melting “Can I keep you?” whispered across a crowded ballroom.

And somewhere between the flicker of the projector and that final, bittersweet dance, I felt something I haven’t felt in years: pure, unfiltered wonder.

Movies like Casper, Hook, and The Goonies—they were portals. Cinematic time machines that swept you away to worlds both magical and dangerous, where kids were clever, adults were complicated, and sincerity wasn’t something to be embarrassed by.

Hollywood doesn’t make those films anymore.

Today, everything is either a billion-dollar IP behemoth or a scrappy micro-budget indie hoping for Sundance glory. The middle—the sweet spot of heartfelt, imaginative adventures—has all but vanished. Those $30–$60 million movies that took risks, built worlds, and wore their hearts on their sleeves have been bulldozed by franchise sprawl.

We traded sincerity for snark.

Craft for content.

Escapism for algorithms.

And I miss it. I miss stepping into a theater and feeling like anything could happen. I miss stories that believed in magic without quotation marks.

Watching Casper again wasn’t just nostalgic—it was clarifying. This is the lane I want to live in. Bold, imaginative, emotionally charged escapism. The kind of storytelling that makes you lean forward in your seat and forget, for a moment, the world outside.

✨👻 VHS forever