Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #217667 in DVD
• Rating: G (General Audience)
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: PAL
• Original language: English
• Running time: 95 minutes

Customer Reviews

The sequel features more action, more special effects and a film starring two of Hollywood's legendary talents
The classic Walt Disney sci-fi film "RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN" (1978) is released on DVD to help celebrate the theatrical release of "RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN" (the third `WITCH MOUNTAIN' film which can be considered a new storyline or a re-imagining of the first film).

"RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN" is the long awaited sequel to "ESCAPE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN" (1975) and continue to be a family sci-fi film to utilize the latest special effects at that time and bring back popular British director John Hough and popular teen talents Ike Iesenmann and Kim Richards to reprise their role as the alien human brother and sister team who have supernatural abilities.

"RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN" focuses on the return of Tony and Tia to the planet Earth. The two haven't been back in several years, so they get the opportunity to have some rest and relaxation.

Meanwhile, a mad scientist named Victor (Christopher Lee) and Letha (Bette Davis) talk about how they should be making money. Letha was once a very rich woman but funded Victor's laboratory in order manipulate people and control them. Victor decides to put Letha's nephew Sickle (Anthony James) to a test by using a remote control device in which Victor talks on it and the person will follow his instructions. His first instruction is to have Sickle climb up a tall building and walk on the rooftop ledge and seeing how the remote control device is actually working on him.

Meanwhile, as Tony and Tia are being driven in their cab, the cab loses fuel prompting the taxi cab driver to get gas. While left alone, Tia's premonitions start kicking in to full gear as she senses a man who will fall to his death from falling from a building.

Knowing that they one would have to wait for the driver, Tony goes to find this man and warn him. Sickle ends up falling from the rooftop but before he can go splat on the pavement, Tony uses his supernatural abilities to have him suspended in air and eventually help him down.

Victor sees that Tony is quite special and thus Victor and Letha inject John with a tranquilizer and kidnaps him.

Tia is scared that she has lost contact with Tony and goes to look for him. She ends up losing him and while trying to look around the area, she sees four kids being chased by a bunch of thugs. She eventually uses her power to save the four kids named Dazzler (Christian Juttner), Muscles (Brad Savage), Crusher (Poindexter Yothers) and Rocky (Jeffrey Jacquet).

The four are trying to be tough kids who want to start their own gang but also hide from their truant officer Mr. Yokomoto (Jack Soo) who wants them back at school.

With no place to go and not knowing the Los Angeles area, the kids decide to help Tia. Meanwhile, Tony has been thoroughly brainwashed by Victor and is now being controlled by him by the remote device.

With Tony revealing his power to the bad guys, now they want to exploit his power to give them leverage and possibly help them steal anything from gold to possible plutonium.

Meanwhile, Tia tries to search for her brother everywhere and when she does find him, she is pitted against her brother in a battle of their super powers. Will she be able to save her brother from being a pawn of Victor and Letha?

SPECIAL FEATURES:

"RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN" includes several special features. Many which were included in the 2003 DVD release but there is one special feature that is exclusive to the 2009 DVD release. Included are:

* ALL NEW Pop-Up Fun Facts - For those who want to watch the film with fun facts popping up on the bottom of the screen.
* Making the Return Trip - A pretty lengthy featurette with interviews with director John Hough, Ike Eisenmann, Kim Richards and the other children from the film. The discussion was how they all came together again, the popularity of the first film and how Ike and Kim, unlike the first film where they worked closely together, this time they didn't. But what is most interesting was to hear how the guys had a crush on Kim Richards.
* The Gang's Back in Town - A reunion of the gang Christian Juttner (Dazzler), Brad Savage (Muscles) and Poindexter Yothers (Crusher) who talk about having fun on the set, having a crush on Kim Richards and how the film was one of the best experiences of their lives.
* Disney Kids with Powers - A short music video of various clips of children in Disney films that have powers.
* "The Eyes Have It" - An animated short featuring Donald Duck and Pluto, as Donald learns hypnotism and his test subject is Pluto.
* Lost Treasure: Christopher Lee: The Lost Interview - An interview with Christopher Lee done back in 1978 with a Spanish television network. Lee talks about working on the film and his experience for a Disney film. Subtitled in English.
* 1978 Disney Studio Album - A short musical featurette featuring stills from all films that were shown in 1978.
* Audio Commentary - Commentary by John Hough, Ike Eisenmann and Kim Richards.

JUDGMENT CALL:

I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by "RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN". Mainly because you have legendary actress Betty Davis and Christopher Lee (known for his work in the past with the Vampire and Fu Manchu films and presently with his work as Count Dooku in the "Star Wars" films) . But it was great to see them out of their typical film element and playing a humorous duo, Letha obsessed with money and Victor obsessed with the power and prestige he can get from utilizing Tony for his own twisted means.

But many people wanted a sequel and this time, the series would managed to capture an action film with an a chase scene and even more special features than the first film. Definitely something you wouldn't imagine seeing in a family film but John Hough wanted to make sure the film was different from the first and if he could, make it even better.

One thing that I liked was that both Tony and Tina are nearly at the same level in their powers. In the first film, it seemed like the only way Tony could use his powers was playing a harmonica. But glad they didn't do that for this film.

I enjoyed the first film for its cat and mouse type of storyline, it was a pure film that is fun for the family and kids. With "RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN", because more special effects were used and more action scenes, it was interesting to see both Tony and Tia separated but most of all, watching them go against each other utilizing their supernatural abilities.

Speaking of special effects, the first film utilized a cat and a bear. "RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN" utilized Albert the goat and it's amazing how trainers were able to get a goat to walk through the middle on top of several cars. Very impressive.

Now, for those who own the 2003 DVD release of "RETURN TO WITCH MOUNTAIN", you may not need this DVD because there really is no major addition in terms of special features but for those who are looking forward to watching Dwayne Johnson in "RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN" in 2009 and have never watched the original films or its been too long since you have last seen it, then definitely pick up both classic Witch Mountain films. They're both fun and enjoyable in their own separate way.

As for "RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN", both "ESCAPE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN" and "RETURN FROM WITCH MOUNTAIN" both come with a free ticket coupon (attached to the slipcase cover) to download a certificate (ticket) in order to watch the latest film at a participating theater for free.

Overall, "RETURN TO WITCH MOUNTAIN" is a fun and enjoyable film and despite being nearly 35 years old, it's a film that families can watch with their children now and still be entertained.

Definitely a Disney classic worth having in your DVD library.

Sorry Disney, this one was a disappointment
This is the 1978 sequel to Disney's 1975 science-fiction-adventure movie, Escape to Witch Mountain Special Edition. In the first movie, we met Tony and Tia Malone, two orphans with extraordinary abilities, like telepathy and telekinesis. It turned out that the siblings were aliens, whose spaceship had crashed, but they are reunited, by the end of the movie, with their uncle.

In the sequel, Tony and Tia are brought to Pasadena so that they can get a chance to see how people live on Earth. This goes badly pretty quickly, thanks to an evil scientist, who is experimenting with a mind control device when he sees Tony perform one of his extraordinary acts, and decides he can became even more famous if he can control Tony's mind. The evil scientist's wealthy patroness sees Tony as a potential goldmine.

Meanwhile, Tia loses contact with Tony, visually and telepathically, and tries to find him. She is helped by a street-gang of boys who are nice but not nearly as tough and mean as they want people to believe they are. She does not find much success and ends up pitted against her mind-controlled brother. Along the way, a big-hearted but inept truancy officer and a goat manage to help the alien siblings survive and try to find each other.

The first Witch Mountain movie featured engaging child actors, an interesting premise, and some action, but weak dialogue and unimpressive special effects. Three years later, after the world had seen the startling spectacle of the first Star Wars movie, the sequel not only showed no improvement, but I see it as a weaker movie than its predecessor. Why?

In the first film, Kim Richards (as Tia) and Ike Eisenmann (as Tony) sounded like they were reading lines read by someone who had never spoken with a child. In the sequel, Ike Eisenmann fares somewhat better, sounding a bit more natural, but Kim Richards has line after line of "Who the heck wrote that?!" lines. The gang of boys who help her also work off a poor script, although Christian Juttner (as Dazzler) manages to overcome his lines to come off okay.

To accompany the child-actors, we have a trio of villains, with two of the roles played by accomplished actors. Christopher Lee portrays Victor, the evil scientist bent on academic fame and glory through ruthless research. Bette Davis portrays Letha, Victor's not-very-bright but very greedy patroness, out to get rich on Victor's research, at the expense of Tony. Both Mr. Lee and Ms. Davis are given lines to speak that are exactly what you would expect their characters to say. Anthony James, Letha's nephew and Victor's inept flunkie.

Given the level reached by special effects when this movie was made, the effects in Return From Witch Mountain are disappointing. In the bonus features, they explain how they used strings and cranes to do the telekinesis and levitation effects. While you do not see any of the strings or cranes, I think that it is obvious that process in effect included them. The levitation in no way resembles flight or any natural movement. The levitation effects in the Harry Potter films were definitely better.

The film also has a credibility issue at times. Suspending disbelief regarding aliens with paranormal abilities is one thing, but it is another thing altogether to expect that a flying saucer could fly in and out of the Rose Bowl, twice, with no one seeing it. And, there is a scene, early in the movie, where Tony displays his telekinetic powers on a public street, and there is no one around, except the two villains, to see the act. Plus, no one is there to see a child being abducted, in broad daylight?

With the sequel, we again have engaging child actors in a movie with an interesting premise -- two alien children with paranormal abilities trying to experience everyday life on Earth -- and plenty of action. However, we again also have a script with stilted dialogue for all of the children, or sub-par special effects. This movie just doesn't work for me.

Oh, except for Alfred the goat! Alfred does his every scene very smoothly, and gives the most credible performance in the movie.

I received this movie, free from Disney, in exchange for an honest review.

-- Chris McCallister, author of Coming Full Circle

no charm the second time around
The Number One movie of the week is Race To Witch Mountain. But I can't handle the idea of substituting kindly Eddie Albert with The Rock, even if he has made a string of family films. So why not check out the gentle original from 1975, whose special effects seemed so nifty at the time. (Heck, I was even excited by the scene where the kids sat in bed and communicated with each other...telepathically!) You knew the brother was going to be prey to bad influences in the sequel Return From Witch Mountain ($19.99 each; Disney) because he was wearing a horrible turtleneck and in general the very modest magic had gone. But you can never go wrong with a story where kids feel special and misunderstood. I asked my sister the night after seeing the first movie if we should try to speak to each other telepathically when we went to bed and she told me I was a loser. But she cheated by saying it out loud. Fine for the very young. Visit me at michaelgiltz dot com.