Very Cool!!!

From my favorite movies..

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

A tough one to review here. Reappraising a film that I watched quite a lot when I was a kid, but now are watching for the first time in around 25 years. Despite some lovely pangs of nostalgia, and some highspots from the animation team, objectively it's pretty average. The film centres on Miss Price, who is training to become a witch via correspondence course from Emelius Brown, who, unbeknownst to her, is a conman, sending out spells from a book he's found and assumes are mumbo jumbo. Her training is interrupted by the arrival of three young evacuees from London, who have been sent to the country to avoid the Blitz. Together they begin an adventure to find the remains of the book, and the last spell. Where the film works; it really works... the animation scenes, consisting of an undersea dance and a game of Football on a nearby island are Disney at the height of the 70's era style. Angela Lansbury is excellent, as is David Tomlinson in the final of his three main Disney starring roles. The climatic scenes, where the small Nazi invasion force are repelled by the contents of the nearby museum coming to life is really well done. My main gripe is that, watching it with an adults perspective, the story doesn't really hang together that well. Rather than a plot, with a story arc, it's more like a bunch of things that happen and are mostly unconnected. I'd imagine that the novel, written by The Borrowers writer Mary Norton, did a better job of that, but the narrative thrust is missing from the film. The subplot with Bruce Forsyth and Sam Jaffe as an aging book enthusiast and his hired muscle appears briefly, before both characters disappear and are never seen again. The kids (particularly the boys) are horribly grating, with their delivery. Roddy McDowell, I assume, took the role as he was contractually obliged too, as despite his third billing he must be in the film for about four minutes. There are a couple of bits that you view differently as an adult, those are clearly prostitutes in the Portobello Road scene and my biggest laugh came at the end when David Tomlinson (54 at the time of the film's release) joins the army (ran close by the number of times the youngest kid makes reference to "his knob" . . . which perhaps only really is funny to a British audience). It was a nice nostalgia buzz to see it again after all these years, but it may be another 25 before I choose to watch it again.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks was a film of its time. Yes, war is a strong feature - but there are covert references to war and violence in a lot of children's films - Mulan? For me, this is an ideal children's film - there is such a sense of escapism involved, whilst at the same time there is no attempt made to conceal that bad things do happen in life.The moral of this story, in my opinion, is that in the face of adversity there is always hope, and in hope there is strength to face the enemy. Whatever form that enemy might take - kids have far superior imaginations than adults and I don't believe that they would take a negative message from a film like this.

do i believe in magic? well, no. i'm sorry to disappoint anyone, but no, there is no such thing as magic. everything can be explained. it's usually all smoke and mirrors.parents should be strongly cautioned about 'Bedknobs and Broomsticks'. not because i believe in witches or magic, that stuff is just a bunch of hocus pocus. there are no such thing as real witches and anyone over the age of six who believes that should have their noggin examined. if someone tries to tell you there is such a thing as real magic or witches, get away from them fast because they are obviously psychotic and probably very dangerous.as a Christian and a person who is concerned with the salvation of man's immortal soul, it's not the magic that bothers me, it's the movie's strong spirit of militarism that bothers me. this movie glorifies war. and what is war good for? absolutely nothing. this movie indoctrinates young children into the military industrial complex at an early age(i mean it's designed for young children). children should not learn to glorify war, they should be wary of it, if not afraid of it. World War II may or may not have been the right decision, but do we need to keep bringing up past wars? especially where children are concerned. nobody wants World War III here. that would be madness.do i like this movie? of course i do. i grew up with this film and it's always been a Disney favorite of mine. it's beautifully handled by director Robert Stevenson, it's very clever, and has a charming musical score by Disney song writers, the Sherman Brothers. the film has many smart insights into history and sometimes i think this film may be more about children than anything else. but every time i get too sentimental and cozy about this film i wake up and think, oh God! THIS IS ABOUT WAR! nobody in their right brain wants a frick'in WAR!as far as the witchcraft element? i said what i think of that. there ain't no such thing and if you believe it's real YOU ARE STUPID. as a Christian does it scare me? oh sometimes i get superstitious and then i wake up. i used to follow astrology in the newspaper and read my horoscope everyday to see if i could find out anything. do you know what happened? absolutely nothing. half the time the stupid horoscope seemed like it was speaking to someone else. hardly any of the advice changed or helped my life in anyway. it just made me believe in silly things.but there are evil, stupid people out there with very little education who actually believe in magic. and it doesn't help that the witchcraft in 'Bedknobs' is far more real than the silly 'Harry Potter' films. i mean 'Astoroth' was a famous occultist and some of the incantation words (though not many) are actual words. does that scare me? of course not dummies. but it does scare some really stupid people who are evil enough to believe it's real. those people's children probably won't mix well with children who come from a more enlightened, intelligent and practical family that won't believe in such idiocy.so be careful with this movie. it could cause you some trouble if you bring it up in the wrong place. as far as my own feelings go, i find this film cute and charming and terribly funny. others might not be as amused. be careful. you are crossing the line with this film. when you endorse or recommend this film you are advocating war. you are also stating that you prefer to take a practical, scientific approach to this world and debunk superstition.for those of you who might read this and still believe witchcraft is real, YOU ARE STUPID. bottom line. keep repeating to yourself "it's only a movie. it's only a movie. than seek therapy.for the families strong and smart enough to deal with this ticking time bomb of a film, take caution and enjoy. it's funny and fun.if you can handle it go for it. HELLBORNE HENBANE AQUINITE GLOW-WORM FIRE FIREFLY LIGHT!

Bedknobs and Broomsticks is often compared to Mary Poppins and rightfully so as both films have a similar story line. A magical nanny is sent to look after children, both have the same leading protagonist (David Tomlinson,) both feature live film and animation, with songs by the Sherman brothers, and both came out of the Walt Disney studio.Bedknobs and Broomsticks involves an apprentice witch who wants to complete her correspondence course in beginning witchcraft, but to do this, she has to search for a magical spell called Subsitutiary Locomotion which will complete her training. The story involves Angela Lansbury, playing the witch, who flies on a magical bed with Tomlinson and her three caretakers, to an animated land attempting to retrieve the spell. In addition, the film is set in World War II, where a mixture of live Nazi's and animated creatures both try to help and hinder Lansbury, Tomlinson, and the children on their adventures. The five characters control the bed through a magical bedknob that transports them from a reality world to a fantasy world and back again.Years ago, I had a record that had the Songs From Bedknobs and Broomsticks on it and loved it! However, when I saw the film on Turner Classic Movies and later researched it, sadly I learned that this film, which could have been a classic, suffers badly because of editing and failed restoration work.The original release of the film played in limited areas and ran about two and a half hours. Disney decided to make its first cuts to the film several months later when it went into wide release. The wide release version is what I saw on Turner Classic Movies. While this film was trimmed by over twenty minutes, most likely to cater to the shorter attention spans of children at the time of wide release, you can easily spot the edits. The Eglantine number is shortened, only a few words of With a Flair remain, The Old Home Guard seems to start in the middle of the second verse of the song, and the wonderful perhaps best song in the film "A Step in The Right Direction" is not there. However, you can hear the instances of the instrumental on the soundtrack.In 1979, the film was re-released again and ludicrously cut even more to about ninety five minutes. For years this is what was played on Standard Cable and Broadcast TV. Only two songs remain in this version. In 1996, Disney attempted to reconstruct the film, but were successful only in spots. About twenty minutes of footage was found and added back into the movie. However, the song "A Step in the Right Direction" was mysteriously not found and remains "Lost." The audio track for the song was recovered, and you can hear this on the Special Edition DVD, with still shots from the film showing what the scenes looked like as the song was song.However, the discarded footage soundtrack was not recoverable, because it had been damaged or lost. Many actors were too old or had passed away and could not re-do their speaking and singing parts, so Disney had to hire extras to dub their voices over the restored footage. The dubbing is horribly bad, especially for the voice-over of one of the children, Charlie, and the voice-over for David Tomlinson, sounds nothing like him! You would think Disney could have at least found actors with voices that resembled the tones, accents, and pitches of the original dialog. It is great that several songs were recovered, but without "Step in the Right Direction," restored back to the film, which is such an uplifting and encouraging song, and the terrible dubbing, the film will be a mixed bag.Why Disney cut "Step in the Right Direction" is criminal! I think Disney should have taken more time to look for it when they did the film restoration project for the 1996 DVD. What SHOULD have been shortened is the animated soccer match, which remains a sequence that does not help the film at all. The "With A Flair" song, as well as "Eglantine" are at their full lengths on the restored DVD, as is the Portobello Road dance sequence. However, some critics feel that the extended version of Portobello Road is too long. The restored DVD has a new song called "Nobody's Problems For Me." My vote would be a choice of versions on a double-sided DVD for future release. Side 1 would contain the widespread DVD release that Turner Classic Movies plays. Side 2 would be the extended version, but WITH the originally undubbed dialog found and remastered with "A Step in the Right Direction" added in if it is ever found! The loss of "Step in the Right Direction" and the bad dubbing in the extended version hurts what could have been a great film. Bedknobs and Broomsticks has the important plot of searching for a missing spell. Tragically ironic that Disney took out bits and pieces of this film that may never be recovered. It is sad to think what this film could have been if the limited release had been LEFT ALONE!