AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

Doomtomylo a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Sameer Callahan It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Haven Kaycee It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

poe426 One of the things that Ray Bradbury did better than most was to find that delicate balance between Light and Dark in his stories (and his characters). While SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES director Jack Clayton gives it the ol' college try, he as often as not misses the mark in that regard. The cinematography is gorgeous, and the scenes are staged and directed with great skill, but the movie more often than not fails to clearly delineate between the truly Light and the unfathomable Dark that is the great motif of this movie. The Dust Witch, for instance (Pam Grier), comes across as a sexy seductress, to be sure- but scary...? Not that I saw. Likewise, Dark himself (Jonathan Pryce), although he does deliver his lines with almost serpentine sliminess, is something less than scary. The fx don't help, nor does the happy ending: it would've been preferable to see the town looking like a ghost town in the end, with empty shops and maybe even the ghosts of proprietors past (and passed) moving through the dark to disappear forever from the minds of those who once knew them.

Bonehead-XL As long as I've read books, I've loved Ray Bradbury. No author has influenced me more. When news of his passing reached me two years ago, I was crestfallen. If anyone could have lived forever, it would have been him. "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is the first novel I ever read cover to cover. It's a rare book where you can put your thumb down on any sentence on any page and find something poetic and beautiful. Bradbury's preferred format was the short story and he never adapted as well to the novel or the screenplay. He happen to write both for the 1983 feature adaptation of "Something Wicked This Way Comes." It's not a great film but is one that has moments of greatness inside of it.The film follows Bradbury's novel quite closely. During a bleak October, the ideal town of Green Town, Illinois is visited by a carnival. Led by the enigmatic Mr. Dark, the carnival seems to grants the most heart-felt wishes of the lonely, sad, scared towns people but at a terrible price. Two young boys, Will Halloway and Jim Nightshade, are swept up by the mystery of the carnival, at first intrigued and then frightened. Will's father becomes an unlikely hero to both, forced to overcome his own regrets and fears into order to protect the boys from the dark dreams of the carnival.The book, "Something Wicked This Way Comes," is something of an allegory, a dark fantasy struggle of good and evil painted across an American small town. I love the book very much but found Bradbury's themes overly simplistic sometimes. Perhaps the only way the film is superior is that Mr. Halloway, frequently long-winded on the page, is a more flawed, more human character on-screen. James Robards is excellent in the part, every regret and bad memory on his face. He is a warm, loving father but one wrecked by guilt for the things he didn't and should have done. If Mr. Halloway is a more realized character in the film, then Mr. Dark is perfectly captured from the page. Bradbury wanted Christopher Lee to play the part, which probably would have been incredible. Yet Jonathan Pryce might be perfect in the role. There is such a real, deep sinister intent behind his every word and action. Mr. Dark isn't quite the Devil himself but something very close. Pryce gives a star-making performance.Both actors and characters are placed against each other in two scenes that stand out over the rest of the film. The first is when the carnival marches down the town's streets. Their trumpets play out a funeral dirge. Will and Jim hide under the sidewalk. Mr. Dark confronts Will's father, searching out the boy. The father tries to mislead the man, the boys' faces tattooed on his palms. In rage at being lied at, Mr. Dark digs his fingers into his own hands, drawling blood. Blood that drips down on Will's face under the street. That's an awfully good scene.However, the second confrontation between father and devil is incredible. The boys hide in the library. Mr. Halloway lifts his head up, taking his glasses off. Suddenly, as swift as a shadow moving into the room, Mr. Dark appears behind him. The two trade barbs, Bradbury's lyrical dialogue dripping off their lips. Mr. Dark snatches Halloway's book away from him. With every page torn away, another year lifts off of the man's life, a glowing page falling to the floor. The scene builds an incredible intensity. Pryce doesn't overdo it. Instead, he spits the words with vigor, rage quivering out of him. The book and film's themes are summed in this scene, undoubtedly one of the darkest ever in a Disney film. If the rest of "Something Wicked This Way Comes" had been as good as this one moment, it would have been a classic for all time.It's a shame the film around those two incredible performances and two fantastic moments is so frequently a drag. The opening and closing narrations, though expressed with Bradbury's lyrical verse, paint the film's themes out too neatly. The subplot concerning Mr. Cooger is unresolved. Royal Dano is delightful as Tom Fury, the lightening rod salesman. Fury's overall importance to the plot is somewhat murky. His sudden reappearance at the end reeks of sloppy writing. A long scene where Will and Jim are attacked by spiders and a hand made of mist in their bedroom is awkwardly executed and goes on much too long. The film's climax is muddled and lacks satisfaction. Charles Halloway escaping the Mirror Maze through the power of love comes off as helplessly hokey. Mr. Dark dragged to his doom by the carousel comes off as grim and mean-spirited. Considering the book ended with Will and Dad pushing Dark with laughter and happiness, the film's ending seems murky and inconclusive. "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is haphazardly paced. The film is only 97 minutes long but feels much longer.Changing the Dust Witch from an old crone to a siren-like embodiment of male desire was a smart decision. Pam Grier is sensual and enchanting in the part. Jack Clayton's direction is occasionally quite striking, such as a single shot of Will and Jim running down the darkened town street. Sometimes, Clayton's direction is a bit flat. The film had a troubled post-production, with rewrites, a completely new ending shot, and a new score recorded. Georges Delerue's original score is appropriately sinister at times but drones too much. James Horner's new score works for the film a little better but it's too light at times. "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is a troubled adaptation of a wonderful book. It's honorable in some ways and worth checking out for Bradbury fans, despite maudlin and uneven elements.

johnstonjames by 1983 a collaboration between Disney and author Ray Bradbury was long overdue. Bradbury had admired Disney for decades and even had a few personal meetings with Disney. since both were highly respected you would think they would have been paired earlier cinematically but it was probably felt that Bradbury wouldn't make for a family film or good Disney. Disney seldom did horror or sci fi, so exploring author Bradbury would make for a whole new venture.1983 was probably when the Disney studios was mature and ready but ironically they were cutting back on Disney live action releases and were in the process of shutting down the Disney back lot in Burbank. 'Something Wicked' was one of the last live action films to be filmed on the Burbank backlot and Disney ranch using the same techniques for production as the old school live action films produced by Walt himself. it was lucky that they got to film a Bradbury movie on the original lot and the way Walt did and under the Disney production banner.not only was it a good thing that the Bradbury film got to be conceived by the Disney old school but it also turned out wonderfully and was a excellent adaptation of the book, and yes, i have read the book.knowing the book i'm sure it wasn't a easy task to bring off. the book is not only too dark for a Disney film, but it is also very descriptive with over half of it being description and literary prose. what works well in descriptive form doesn't always easily translate to quick, precise visuals that move a film along as cinema. the finished result here is so good because it manages to convey the literary importance of the book without compromising itself as quick moving cinema. the literary aspect is well preserved but the film also moves fast enough as not to be too long for cinema audiences and not too long for children and the family viewers which should be Disney's target audience. the film is beautifully atmospheric which gives homage to the literary element as well as elegantly photographed and directed. it is a class act all the way.is it scary? well yes, i think so. it's not too scary for kids or Disney, but scary enough to justify itself as horror. things also move quicker and are less subtle than the book so the Dark circus itself comes off as more homicidal and aggressive in snatching away it's woeful victims than even the book described.excellent adaptation of a difficult source as well as classic Disney and very good cinema. a must for anyone interested in the final films from the original Burbank studio and the old school staff.

Coventry Ten years old I was when I first saw "Something Wicked This Way Comes"… It was a movie that I loved and got fascinated with from the very first moment and long afterwards. Today I re-watched it for the first time in more than twenty years and, although I still definitely loved it a lot, it also brought me to draw another additional conclusion: this film is far too disturbing for 10-year-olds! Okay it's a Disney production and the story qualifies as a fantasy, but there are a few petrifying characters as well as a handful of sequences that are downright nightmare-inducing, like the giant spider invasion in the bedroom or the climax on the merry-go-round. Scenes like these, as well as several others, apparently got unconsciously burned on my retina because I immediately experienced flashbacks to childhood nightmares when I saw them again. I've always been intrigued by the "darker" kids' movies (other favorites include "Dark Crystal", "Island at the Top of the World", "Return to Oz" and "Escape from Witch Mountain"), but "Something Wicked etc…" is inarguably the darkest of them all.The story sprung from the versatile mind of the widely acclaimed and immensely popular author Ray Bradbury. He loved this story so much (or maybe didn't trust anyone else?) that he himself adapted his own novel into a movie script and, for the direction, opted for the reliable and highly professional Jack Clayton. The result became a, as mentioned already, pitch-black fantasy movie that is perhaps flawed and definitely comes across as dated in the year 2012, but it still ranks as the creepiest and less sentimental Disney movie ever released. The arrival of the ominous Dark's Pandemonium Carnival is an all but joyous event in a sleepy little town during autumn. The eerie Mr. Dark and his crew particularly target the nostalgic and phantasmagoric adults in town, who are all too willing to sacrifice whatever it takes make their dreams come true, whether it's richness, lust or eternal youth. The most rational person in town is actually a young boy, Will Halloway, and he has more than his hands full with helping his friend Jim and even his own father Charles to resist the carnival's Temple of Temptation. "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is a masterfully narrated story, with a terrific gloomy atmosphere and wonderfully imaginative decors & set pieces. The merry-go-round, the mirror palace, the exotic show … They're all very uncanny! My main complaint is actually that, after a rather slow-paced and patient introduction of the film, the middle-section and especially the finale, seem overly rushed and incomplete. I think I would have much rather seen "SWTWC" as a mini-series, perhaps in three or four episodes of one hour running time each, but further elaborating on all the hinted sub plots like Jim Nightshade's father, Tom Fury the lightening expert and the background of the townspeople. Stellar performances all around, most notably Jason Robards as the wise father and Jonathan Pryce as the wayward Mr. Dark, but also from the young actors and B-movie queen Pam Grier as the seductive but dangerous circus wench. I'm not sure if I'll let my own kids watch it when they're still too young and easily petrified, but it forever remains an all-time favorite childhood classic.