Eisner, Katzenberg, & Wells get the lion's share of the credit for making Disney into the juggernaut it is today. They deserve all the credit they get; they changed Walt Disney Pictures in so many ways. However, I think it's safe to assume that Walt Disney Pictures would have evolved and survived without Eisner, Katzenberg, & Wells' assistance. The proof? They were already starting to do so when the trio of executives showed up. The strongest example of Disney's attempted evolution is their dabblings in the horror genre. In 1980, Disney released The Watcher In The Woods, the studio's first venture into horror. The film was a source of contention in the studio, due to re-editing that muddled the storyline and a rushed release that left the special effects unfinished. The Watcher In The Woods disappeared from theaters quickly, having failed to recoup its costs. Disney, however, wasn't about to give up on horror; soon after The Watcher In The Woods was released, the studio bought the film rights to Ray Bradbury's 1962 novel Something Wicked This Way Comes, a book considered to be one of the finest horror novels of the twentieth century. Ray Bradbury had been trying to get a film version of Something Wicked This Way Comes going for some time. Famed dancer/actor/director Gene Kelly had planned to make the film, but eventually backed out of the project. Bradbury and Sam Peckinpah had written an adaptation for Peckinpah to direct, but Peckinpah wasn't able to get funding for the project. Finally, Bradbury and director Jack Clayton came together and wrote another adaptation. The latter adaptation was the one that Disney accepted. The film's plot revolves around Jim Nightshade (Shawn Carson) and Will Halloway (Vidal Peterson), two young boys growing up in Green Town, Illinois, in the 1930s. When Mr. Dark's Pandemonium Carnival arrives in town and sets up shop over the course of one night, Jim and Will go to investigate, along with the rest of the town. Jim and Will soon discover the carnival's dark secret: Mr. Dark (Jonathan Pryce) grants carnival-goers their deepest desires, in exchange for their souls and an eternal life as sideshow attractions in the carnival. Jim & Will team up with Will's father Charles (Jason Robards) in a battle with Mr. Dark for the souls of Green Town's residents. Jack Clayton's adaptation of Something Wicked This Way Comes, like Bridge To Terabithia, is one of the few film adaptations that manages to entirely capture the feel of the novel. Clayton depicts Green Town in an idealized way, giving the film the sense of nostalgia that Bradbury evoked in the novel. All of the film's characters speak in poetic soliloquies that we rarely hear in real life but read all the time in Bradbury novels. Even the horrific elements have a sense of wonder that only Bradbury could evoke. The film is admittedly flawed: the first half of the movie moves at an extremely slow pace. The film is occasionally too poetic for its own good (as Bradbury's novels and stories sometimes are). However, the second half of the film is about as good as a horror movie can get. The film's best scene, a verbal duel between Mr. Dark and Charles Halloway in the town library, is one of the most amazing arguments ever filmed. Both Pryce and Robards are at the top of their form in the scene, going at each other with understated fury. The moment when Mr. Dark tears Charles' grandfather's book to pieces is particularly suspenseful. Such scenes as the library scene are typical of the second half of the film, making up for the flaws of the first half. Something Wicked This Way Comes flopped upon its initial release, only recouping eight million dollars of its twenty-four-million-dollar budget. The film has never recovered from its initial failure; it can now only be seen on a bare-bones DVD. The film is a real gem, however; it's definitely worth the search for the DVD.
Alan Howell is a native of Southern California. He loves movies of any and all kinds, Hollywood, indie, and everywhere in between. He loves pizza, sitcoms, rock and pop music, surfing, baseball, reading, and girls (not necessarily in that order).
