Labyrinth (1986)

The Labyrinth is a fairly popular cult film of the 80's, amazingly growing up in the early 80's I never saw this film before now, so this was in some ways quite a treat. Jim Henson has always put forth amazing work in terms of puppetry, and I was a huge fan of much of his work while growing up such as Fraggle Rock, the original Muppet movies, and later on in the 90's a series inspired by Henson's work, Dinosaurs, which is still one of my top favorite TV shows. Labyrinth is definitely worth some of the praise it receives in terms of production value, but as an overall film there are major hindrances which keep this from being a solid classic.
 

Jennifer Connelly stars as Sara, a fifteen year old girl stuck between fantasy and reality as she spends most of her free time reciting lines from a story entitled The Labyrinth. Sara's a little bit self involved and takes that out on her step-mother and infant step-brother Toby. When asked to watch Toby one evening Sara becomes aggravated with her little brother who refuses to stop crying, and in a fit of frustration wishes the Goblin King would come take her brother away, and to her surprise he does. Sara attempts to take back her wish, now that it's come true, but Jareth the Goblin King refuses to adhere to her pleas, instead he gives her the chance to rescue him if she can adverse through the labyrinth within thirteen hours, otherwise Toby will become one of his goblins.

Production wise Labyrinth is top notch for it's time, and probably only the special effects could be bettered with today's technology, the sets and characters are all very lifelike and believable which really helps bring the fantasy essence of the film to life. Jennifer Connelly does a fine job in one of her earlier roles, it's certainly nothing amazing but she definitely proves she has some talent at such a young age. David Bowie as Jareth the Goblin King is where I have to begin faulting Labyrinth because he was sorely miscast.

Bowie's acting is horrendous, and his singing isn't anything better, added with the fact the musical numbers are borderline awful and Bowie looks like he stepped out of a Madonna video, it all lowered my overall rating for the film. Honestly I didn't see the purpose of having musical numbers in the first place, especially when they were as bad as they were. If the strange rock style villain was what they were truly looking for they should have cast Billy Idol, the guy has a better villainous look and is a much better singer.

Overall, I have to give Labyrinth a mildly average score, casting Bowie as the villain was an awful move and the songs are so horrible that it really drags down the overall enjoyment of the film, which was quite high when neither was around. Also don't expect much of a story, Labyrinth really bases it's entire plot on meeting the next unusual character and progressing through to the next scene, it's something that could go on indefinitely. If your looking for a good fantasy film I'd recommend The Neverending Story, or Return To Oz over this, but if your a big Henson fan or a hardcore David Bowie fan you might find it more enjoyable than I did.

6/10