Forgotten Movies: On Our Own
The longest and most in-depth review of a movie nobody cares about.
The older I get I tend to have flashbacks to my past. I don’t know what’s happening. It’s like my subconsciousness is trying to alert me of a memory that is about to disappear. This recently happened with the movie On Our Own. I kept thinking about it for some reason. After speaking to my wife about it, she also had vague memories of this movie, too.
Some Background
On Our Own was released in 1988 as a made-for-TV drama. The plot focuses on siblings Mitch, Kate, Travis and Lori Robbins’ quest to find their uncle. The film starts tragically with an ambulance driving to an apartment building. You soon discover that the children’s mother was sick and passed away. Additionally, you learn that their father is nowhere to be found. The children are orphaned and will become subjects of the state.
When the youngest sibling, Lori, discovers that she’ll be fostered by a family, the eldest brother, Mitch, decides they won’t be broken up. He hatches a plan to break out of the facility and drive their mom’s VW Bug to their uncle’s house.
The Central Role of Vehicles
Vehicles play a massive part in this film. I think that’s why this film has stayed with me for so long. Mitch loads up his siblings in their mother’s beat-up VW Bug, despite the fact that he doesn’t have a driver’s license. The most unbelievable part about him driving his siblings isn’t that he’s underaged but how good he is a driving a manual transmission. He’s so good that he doesn’t even stall the car—just dumps the clutch and makes it jump a bit.
The scenes of the VW driving in the desert are beautiful. They convey a sense of freedom and hope. Cars have always been a source of freedom for me. Especially cool old cars like a VW Bug.
Mitch being the adolescent that he is doesn’t make wise choices. One of the turning points in the film is when he rejects his sister’s advice to stop and rest. Instead, he pushes on, falls asleep at the wheel, and crashes the car into a cactus off of the road. When the siblings wake up, they realize how close they were to drive down a ravine.
All hope seems lost just when Peggy notices the kids off in the distance. She stops her 1988 VW Jetta to ask them if they need help. Mitch spouts off a lie that their dad left to get gas at the next town. Peggy gives them a lift in the hope that she’ll find their father. When she reaches the next gas station, it becomes obvious that their dad isn’t there and that there’s something else going on. Peggy stops to use a payphone (this is the 80s after all) to call the police.
The ever-enterprising Mitch spots his opportunity while Peggy isn’t looking and steals her car. The siblings make some more progress until they need to stop and eat. Mitch runs the Jetta into a fence and damages the radiator.
Eventually, Peggy finds them, helps them escape a fight, and offers to drive them to their Uncle Jack’s house. They make some headway into their journey until the car overheats and they’re stranded once again. This is when a truck driver stops his Peterbilt semi-truck to give them a lift.
They make it to Uncle Jack’s house where they discover airplanes, nice cars, ATVs, and the whereabouts of children’s father. It seems like they’re in luck. Instead, of being welcomed into their uncle’s home they’re offered a ride to Peggy’s car where they end up staying in a motel. The next day, it’s decided that they’ll take the bus to where their dad is. When Mitch spots two police officers, he steals the bus with his siblings in tow.
The police and Peggy pursue the bus into the desert. Mitch thinks they’re free until he spots a roadblock in the distance. Just when you think all hope is lost, their Uncle Jack saves the day by flying over the bus and landing on the highway before the roadblock. This scene is one of the most literal examples of using deus ex machina in a plot that I’ve seen in a film. Uncle Jack is a godsend who descends from the sky in a flying machine. Again, I never said this movie was good.
The vehicles used in this movie are quite good. They get progressively more technical as the plot gets closer to its climax. The VW Bug is one of the most simple cars ever built. In the film, the Bug is tired and eventually quits on the siblings. I think it represents their mother. The Jetta is like a newer version of the Bug. It’s the modern equivalent. Peggy is their rescuer, in a way, their new mother. It makes sense that she drives a similar car but newer and more reliable.
The bus is large and formidable. It’s Mitch’s last-ditch effort of finding freedom, which makes sense why he uses it to force his will. The police couldn’t stop the bus but their uncle could. He arrives like an angel to save them from their predicament in his airplane. I could be totally wrong but I think the vehicles were carefully chosen to communicate an underlying meaning.
Lots of Utah Weirdness
I’m originally from Utah. If you’ve never been to Utah then know this: the state has a culture all its own. This is because the LDS church is based in Utah. The state’s tie to the LDS church has created a unique culture that interpreted through the doctrine of the church. Basically, members of the church project their beliefs onto every scenario of daily life in Utah. This includes the media.
The version of On Our Own that I watched as a kid was distributed by Feature Films for Families, which added additional content to the films to align with LDS teachings. There are two versions of the film you can watch online. The Feature Films for Families version has scenes with an elderly woman baking a cake while talking on the phone.
The original version of the film doesn’t have any of these scenes. The scenes with the elderly woman seem normal until you look into them closer. Her scenes are focused on moral imperatives about the choices Mitch makes. She comments on how his choices are wrong and how he deserved the punishment he received for his actions.
Don’t get me wrong, I think her critiques were correct about Mitch. I wouldn’t want my kids driving around in the desert and stealing cars. My problem with the added scenes is that they take away from the original concept of the story. They add an agenda to the film that I don’t think needed to be included. Just let the film be what it is without beating the viewer over the head with the obvious.
Conclusion
Ok, I think I’ve written the longest and most in-depth review of a movie nobody cares about. But I started this Substack to talk about whatever I want and here it is.
Should you watch On Our Own? No. It’s not that great of a movie. The vehicle shots in the desert are nice but the plot is shallow and predictable. I think this film could have been so much more than it was had the writers gone deeper into the story of their father. Instead, they took the easy way out with their Uncle Jack (who turns out not to be their real uncle) landing his plane on the highway.
Admittedly, the scenes with the elderly woman give the film a bit more depth and foreshadowing but come across as a little too on-the-nose for my liking. Had I not watched this film as a child, I wouldn’t have thought twice about it. But being young and impressionable is a powerful thing.
It's funny that you wrote about this. I've had flashbacks to this show several times over the years but I couldn't remember the name of it or even the plot. I just remembered a shot of the bug driving in the desert and crashing, and the memory was always triggered by a song, I think bon jovi "living on a prayer." I had completely forgot about the old lady until you mention it, so apparently I got the Mormon version too. I don't think I ever thought too much about the movie when I watched it, but I get a vague memory of the old lady scenes being confusing as to how they were tied to the story. Good write up, you cleared up a lot of foggy memories for me. And why are the uncles always Jack?