Thrashbrowns v. Mouse House, Round 16

 Escape to Witch Mountain (1975)

The Story:

A brother and sister with strange supernatural powers go on the run from a pair of sinister old bald men. They cross paths with a belligerent old guy who agrees to help them get to a location where they can find the answers to their mysterious past that they seek.

Has Thrashbrowns seen this? Why or why not?

I have vague memories of images from this movie. So I know I saw it back in the day. Like way back in the day. But I didn't remember a whole lot about it.

The Good:

The cast includes Eddie Albert, Donald Pleasance and Ray Milland in prominent roles and all three of them are very solid. The story has a ton of potential. There's a cute cat. The kid actors may have rough patches in their performances, but they mostly pull their roles off and carry the movie. Except for the kid who played Truck. That kid's awesome, the perfect asshole bully kid.

The Bad:

Most of the bad things in this movie are artifacts of being made in the mid-1970s. The pacing is slow. The ending car chase kinda dawdles along without much excitement. The flashback scenes are placed in spots where they kill the build-up of tension. The effects shots don't come anywhere close to holding up. In fact, there are a couple of shots involving a helicopter that look so phony, I'm a little shocked they fooled audiences back when the flick came up.

Most Annoying Disney-ism:

The cutesy animal sidekicks. Only they aren't so annoying here. Winky the cat is adorable. And the bear that the two kids release gave me my biggest laugh of the movie. So yeah, there's a Disney-ism here, but it's not so annoying.

Does Thrashbrowns get why people love this?

I think so. It's not a bad time and if you saw this as a kid, I'm sure it captured your imagination. You can understand the kid's motivation of wanting to go home and recover their identities and past. That's very relatable. If you saw this at the right age and you had issues at home or were searching for your identity, I can see how this might resonate with you.

Did Thrashbrowns like it?

I enjoyed it and I especially appreciated how this movie tells a supernatural sci-fi story on a smaller scale without a lot of epic special effects shots. It gave me a lot of ideas for movies I might want to write myself.

Put it this way, I enjoyed Escape to Witch Mountain enough to want to watch the sequel and the remake that stars The Rock. 

Up next:

I'm considering A Goofy Movie and Lilo & Stitch. Do you have a preference? Hit me up on Facebook and let me know. Otherwise. I'm flipping a coin.