>>58699296The goal is seeing the body, but the journey is the important part.
You see these kids going "hey, we'll find this body, and we will call the police, and be the heroes who found it!". But when you follow the story, one talks how he doesn't feel part of his family, the other having to deal with lost and betrayal, another having to be the mature person when the adults leave him on his own.
Hell, the protagonist lost his older brother, and his father said "why couldn't haven't been you?".
These are boys trying to hold onto innocence in a world that will probably chew them out. And it did: when everyone went their ways, one grows up and becomes a lawyer, the other turns criminal and does time, another just dissapears in a mediocre job with a family that doesn't love him, and the last one was murdered when he was out of college.
Stand by Me is a movie about 4 kids growing up and leaving childhood behind. And when time has passed, the main man remembering those days and think "I'll never meet people like them again."