Movie Review: Labyrinth (1986)

This movie’s not really for me, but that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate it. Jim Henson’s puppetry is truly incredible. With only a few small exceptions, you completely buy all these creatures as actual people. That stuff is pretty great.

But really if you take away the fun puppets and monsters and some visual flair, this movie’s an incredibly generic fantasy adventure, with a few musical numbers that kind of come out of nowhere, by way of David Bowie as the Goblin King.

It’s sort of a modern Wizard of Oz, as it even has the same kind of message, with the main character, Sarah (Jennifer Connelly), hating her home life, except the presentation is weird, because almost all of her hatred is directed at her baby brother, which is weird.

The scene where she lashes out at him is the worst scene in the movie, I think. She nearly (and eventually does) recite a phrase that lets the Goblin King take the baby, but as she nearly says it, it cuts to a bunch of goblins, excited that she might say it. But it’s just weird. They’re in another dimension, I guess, but the way it’s shot doesn’t really convey that. And the scene isn’t just weird for that. It’s definitely weird to see a 16-year-old girl holding a baby up and yelling at it. Like with The Wizard of Oz, I feel like the main character was written to be a lot younger than she actually is, because seeing behaviour like this from a legal adult is just strange.

And I hate to say it, but Jennifer Connelly isn’t great here. She’s good when she’s just kind of looking at things with awe and wonder.

And I’d have liked to see more of that because it make sense for the setting and story. But her line delivery is incredibly unconvincing in most scenes.

The movie’s okay. Again, obviously not for me, but I could easily see kids enjoying this.

Rating: 5/10