By adult standards, Willow is too long and has an unimaginative story, and a lazy screenplay with too many clunker dialogue lines. But the fact that there's nothing very memorable here for the classic fantasy stakes doesn't keep Willow from being an entertaining kid's film in the sub-Lord of the Rings genre. The biggest negative is an extremely generic storyline, with babies delivered by mountain stream, an evil queen seeking her destiny, and a collection of unlikely outcasts coming together to defend innocence from harm. For all the photographic beauty on view, the drama is utterly colorless, so adults may find themselves snoozing.

However, Savant's seen the show entertain kids enough to know that the above objections don't count very heavily. The main positive are the animated and peppy characterizations. The Kilmer warrior is a standard fighting hero, and little is made of his sweetheart (on and off screen) Whalley, who as the daughter of a tyrant should by all rights be at least a bit conflicted. What the kids eat up on each time is the fully-realized elfin village, and especially the Ufgood family, who are virtuous and vulnerable. They're exactly the kind of folk who get killed by the 'evil' characters in most movies like this, and Lucas/Howard give themselves an edge by presenting them straight and dignified, refraining from cheap humor at their expense. The lesser movies in this genre (oh, Masters of the Universe, for one) concentrate so much on conflict and cruelty, that the focus here on sweetness, caring and respect is a definite plus.

The tiny Brownies (Kevin Pollack & Rick Overton) who assist Willow are easily pegged as another incarnation of the bickering thieves from The Hidden Fortress, who showed up again as robots in Lucas's You Know What. An animal-aide comes in the form of the sorceress, who starts off as a Lemur and spends quite a while as a goat, before becoming a charming elderly lady. Val Kilmer's hero-thief is dashing enough, but just too generic to linger in the memory; he's aided by a screenplay that contrives nice escapes, such as when a jealous husband goes violent just in time to save him from Bavmorda's soldiers. Instead of smuggling a princess or a pair of robots, this time everyone's struggling to protect a baby (who I suppose is a princess.) Kids delight in seeing the baby's 101 facial reactions; its amusing expressions are intercut to react to everything from monsters to cute animals, better than Swee'Pea in Popeye. The constant cutaways to the tot work far better than they should, as adults are suckers for cute babies too.

Villainess Jean Marsh is unfortunately given little to do except be menacing and unpleasant, and goes by unnoticed, when she should be remembered for her work in Frenzy and Upstairs, Downstairs. Diminuitive Billy Barty has a great spin as an elfin Wizard, and comes off like Laurence Olivier compared to the actors around him; it's nice to see him get a role with so much dialogue, a chance to have some presence.

Willow's magical scenes are somewhat overpowered by the physical beauty of its locations in New Zealand, the UK, and in Marin County here in California. Rich, dark forests and fantastic mountain vistas are for once the real thing and not studio sets or matte paintings; the best thing about this show.

The time gap between us and Willow's original wearying ad campaign helps in liking the film too. The teaser copy read, "Forget all you know, or think you know," just the kind of insulting, pro-consumer pap that our latter-day Disney imitators equate with wisdom.

20th Fox's DVD of Willow will please everyone, with its pristine picture and strong audio tracks. James Horner's slightly-too-emphatic score comes across well. Besides an original featurette, added-value producer Jeffrey Schwarz has created a snappy short docu that concentrates on just one facet of the effects, the morphing illusions done with the 'primitive' computer graphics of 1988. This is better than trying to tell the full production story in boring detail. A good commentary is voiced by the very likeable Warwick Davis, who makes for a perfectly informative and entertaining host, with nicely judged observations on the entire filming process.

On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor, Willow rates:
Movie: Good
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent
Supplements: Commentary by Warwick Davis, featurette, new mini docu on Morphing, Still gallery, trailers, TV spots, etc. Spanish Dolby surround track.
Packaging: Keep case
Reviewed: November 17, 2001