Return to Oz (1985)
Directed by Walter Murch
Dorothy, saved from a psychiatric experiment by a mysterious girl, finds herself back in the land of her dreams, and makes delightful new friends, and dangerous new enemies.
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What critics compared Return to Oz to
In a plot turn reminiscent of the poorly received Return to Oz, Wonderland has gone to seed, and it’s up to Alice to rescue it by defeating the Jabberwock, a fearsome creature under the control of the villainous Red Queen (Helena Bonham-Carter).
Rather than a straight adaptation of Carroll’s stories, Woolverton has chosen to stage her story 13 years after the events in the books, which essentially makes this film a sequel of sorts; its closest cousin in this arena is another Disney-sanctioned reworking of classic children’s literature, Walter Murch’s Return to Oz (1985), an extremely dark and violent product of the Reagan era that has virtually nothing to do with Victor Fleming’s candy-colored musical.
This “Alice” adventure is conceived as more of a sequel, treading where “Return to Oz” and “Hook” already splashed up a storm.
Once there she finds it in a state of turmoil and disrepair (Return to Oz anyone?), which is the point at which Burton's Alice begins to come unstuck.
Returning to an era when family features weren't afraid to be a little scary, "Alice Through the Looking Glass" reminds on more than one occasion of 1985's notoriously freaky Disney sequel "Return to Oz."
Even Walter Murch's "Return to Oz," one of the greatest examples of '80s kindertrauma, is able to make sharp contrasts between Oz as both a place of wonder and a ravaged nightmare landscape.
Look, they already tried to do “grimdark Wizard of Oz” with the childhood trauma-inducing Return to Oz…
Those flying monkeys are almost as terrifying as the Wheelers of the 1985 Return to Oz that haunted many a child’s nightmares.
…embracing the edge of its revisionist ancestor (Return to Oz)…
In addition to his contributions to those icons of late-1980s marketing, the California Raisins, Gustafson worked on the Nome King effects for Millennial cult favorite-slash-nightmare fuel Return to Oz (1985) and on Will Vinton’s profoundly strange claymation adventure feature The Adventures of Mark Twain (1985).
Del Toro (who co-wrote the film with frequent collaborator Patrick McHale) directed this stunning stop-motion reworking of Carlo Collodi’s classic tale alongside animation legend Mark Gustafson ( The Adventures of Mark Twain ; Fantastic Mr. Fox ; Return to Oz ; The PJs ), and the resulting work is both beautiful and low-level terrifying—exactly the kind of movie kids of all ages should be able to appreciate.
Academy Award®-winning director Guillermo del Toro (“ The Shape of Water “) and award winning, stop-motion legend Mark Gustafson (“ Return to Oz “) team up to reimagine the classic Carlo Collodi tale of a wooden boy, Pinocchio, on an enchanted adventure that transcends worlds and reveals the life-giving power of love.
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In an era when movies made with children in mind play it too safe, this one harkens back to a time and tone similar to 1984's "Gremlins," 1985's "Return to Oz," and, perhaps most surprising of all, Bob Balaban's 1989 pitch-black suburban satire "Parents."
Indeed, from the beginning of the colour-drenched prologue, it's clear the film owes more to cinematic fever-dreams like Ridley Scott's Legend and Walter Murch's Return To Oz than the not-so-magical realism of 21st century fantasy like the Harry Potter franchise.
La manera como Lowery y su estupendo equipo de producción dan vida a este quimérico personaje parecería hallar su inspiración en algún punto entre el Rey de los Nomos de Return to Oz y los dioses forestales de Princess Mononoke : corpulento, con piel de corteza de árbol, ramas y raíces en lugar de músculos y ligamentos, intimidante desde que entra por la puerta montado a caballo -tan verde como él-, pero con un porte que sugiere gentileza y temeridad.
Return to Oz (1985) and Labyrinth (1986) didn’t hold back from being dark and scary – it left an impression on youngsters.
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"Pan" could definitely frighten very young children in a similar (if not quite as intense) fashion as 1985's "Return to Oz."
Some films are such classics that the very notion of a sequel is anathema: you can't do a follow-up to The Wizard of Oz sans Judy Garland and Harold Arlen songs any more than you could remake Casablanca .
Walter Murch made a game try with 1985's Return to Oz—which introduced such other viable Baum characters as Ozma, Jack Pumpkinhead, Tik-Tok, Billina, Mombi and the Nome King—and word has it that John Boorman will attempt rebooting The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.