Something Wicked This Way Comes dvd movie.|
Something Wicked This Way Comes buy bestselling dvd movies, videos find reviews, ratings, prices |
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List Price: $14.98 Features • Color • Dolby • Full Screen • Letterboxed • Widescreen • NTSC In Theaters : 29 April, 1983 DVD Release : 21 September, 1999 |
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Something Wicked This Way Comes description Ray Bradbury adapted his own novel for Something Wicked This Way Comes, Jack Clayton's beautiful rendering of the turn-of-the-century fantasy of a mysterious carnival that literally blows into a small town to taunt and tempt the inhabitants. Jonathan Pryce (Brazil), the handsome but demonic proprietor of Dark's Pandemonium Carnival, preys upon the vanities, the delusions, and the regrets of the townspeople by granting their wishes at the expense of their souls. Jason Robards, as the meek librarian Charles Halloway, becomes his unlikely nemesis when his son Will, with his best friend Jim Nightshade (a deliciously dark name in its own right), discovers the secret of Dark's nightmarish carnival. When they become hunted by Dark's minions (including Pam Grier as the beautiful and mysterious Dust Witch), Halloway must confront his own fears and regrets to save the boys. Clayton captures the idyll of childhood in the fall with rich autumnal colors, his camera gliding along with the energetic boys as they tear through field and forests. The climax, however, gets lost in a cacophony of competing special effects, imaginatively visualized but never very terrifying, as if producer Disney resisted the uneasy undercurrent of the story. It's more dark fantasy than horror, a nightmarish adventure filtered through the memory of a man remembering his childhood in mythic terms. --Sean Axmaker |
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| ♥♥♥♥♥ | Almost a perfect film. . . |
| SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES has finally been remastered and reissued by Disney proper, and this is the only way you can see the film in its original 1:85 aspect ratio. Both Widescreen and Pan and Scan versions are provided on the disc. The picture and sound are outstanding, the beautiful October colors of Greentown and its valley well realized. Also included is the original trailer (which hit theatres before James Horner's wonderful score was ready, so other music was used. Pity.)
As for the film itself, it received an unfair drubbing on its original release. No film can truly capture Ray Bradbury's masterpiece of innocence and corruption, triumph and loss, joy and regret, light and dark. Bradbury's poetic prose is intended for the reader, not the speaker. And yet, his own screenplay (he is an accomplished screenwriter, too) comes close. The tone of the film is well balanced, hued in boyhood remembrance. The characters speak not in modern, colloquial English, but in the rich verbiage of the early twentieth century. Their Greentown is as much a creation of the heart as of the hand, where decent people live decent, caring lives. Into this idyllic autumnal setting comes Cooger and Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show (shortened for the film to Dark's Pandemonium Carnival). It arrives in a dead, black railroad train and sets up in a sudden flash of lightning. The carnival is here to grant your deepest, most special wish, but take care: there is a terrible price to be paid. Jack Clayton (who was talked out of retirement and signed on as director due to his work on the classic film THE INNOCENTS) brings his sure hand to SOMETHING WICKED, performing a delicate balancing act. Kirk Douglas had been trying to make the film for years through his Bryna Company, and his son Peter brought the project to Disney, which in the early Eighties was trying to break away from its dull Seventies image. They signed a magnificent cast: Jason Robards, Diane Ladd, Pam Grier, Ellen Geer, Royal Dano, Jack Dodson, James Stacy, Angelo Rossitto, Bruce Fischer and as the demonic Mr. Dark, Jonathan Pryce. As the boys Will and Jim are Vidal Peterson and Shawn Carson. All handle Bradbury's wordsmithing with aplomb, especially old pros Robards and Pryce. And the music: this film is blessed with one of James Horner's most inspired scores (which, I believe, had never been issued on LP or CD). Not a horror film as such, but a dark fantasy. Now, some may argue that the film changes things in the novel, mostly to make it more cinematic. No novel comes to the screen untouched. Ray Bradbury knows that better than most, so when he adapted his own work, he kept the movie medium in mind. Granted, it was a troubled production, and there was much post-production re-editing, but SOMETHING WICKED, I feel, still stands as a rough gem, coming as close to the spirit of the novel as possible. I like it. I recommend it. 'nuff said. |
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