The Cauldron of Nightmares!! (1984)
Video from revamped Nostalgia was Way Better when I was a Kid Netsite, Oct. 21st, 2007
Exterior – Spiral Castle – Nighttime (Animation)
We see the dark visage of Spiral Castle in the background. Lightning flashes. Thunder crashes over an ominous score. A deep-voiced Narrator describes the setting.
(Image source “scrooge-mcduck.fandom.com”)
Narrator
Long ago, in the land of Prydain, evil lurked. The fearsome Horned King, servant of the diabolical Arawn, Death-Lord, has unleashed terror upon the men and women of the land. The terror of…The Black Cauldron!!
Lightning flashes, CUT TO:
Interior – Larry’s Study
Larry, host and writer for the net show, sits behind a desk in front of all of his nerdy books and toys. Figures of Taran, Gurgi, and Princess Eilonwy sit on the desk in front of him. His jaunty theme music plays in the background.
Larry
Hi, I’m Larry, and “Nostalgia was Way Better when I was a Kid”. And today we’re dipping once again into the endless well of nightmare juice that was Disney in the 1980s. Specifically, we’re talking about The Black Cauldron.
Creepy fanfare music plays; title card of the episode name superimposes briefly.
Larry (Cont’d)
Distilled from the warped minds of Brian “I made fairies scary again” Froud and Tim “even my puppies are terrifying” Burton, 1984’s The Black Cauldron brings the world of Lloyd Alexanders’ Chronicles of Prydain books to un-life. And yes, nightmares…I mean spoilers ahead, children.
Exterior – Caer Dallben – Daytime (Animation)
Taran sits next to the inquisitive pig Hen Wen, pushing his long, shaggy hair out of his eyes.
Taran
It’s not fair, Hen Wen. In my heart of hearts, I am a warrior borne, but my status leaves me but a keeper of pigs…no offense.
Hen Wen squeals sympathetically. Scene cuts to other clips of the movie, which play silently as Larry describes them in voiceover.
Larry (Voiceover)
The adventure begins with our big eyed, small mouthed, angst-ridden protagonist Taran, an assistant pig keeper who looks after a psychic pig who can see into the future. When said pig naturally escapes because Taran is busy playing soldier, Taran sets out to find the pig, but naturally gets caught up in the middle of a big battle alongside the forces of the noble Prince Gwydion, who are ambushed by (dramatic voice) The Living Deeaaddd! [dramatic fanfare plays] Taran is knocked unconscious by a skeletal warrior and wakes up in a tent.
Interior – Eilonwy’s Tent (Animation)
Taran awakes and starts to explore the tent.
Taran
Where am I…?
Gurgi
(crazy laugh) Awake! Awake it is!! Mistress, awake he has become!!!
Taran screams, causing Gurgi to scream.
(Image source “andreasdeja.blogspot.com”)
Larry (V.O.)
And this charming little hellspawn is Gurgi the beast man, who is practically the deconstruction of the “cute Disney sidekick” trope. His eyes and voice will haunt your nightmares. Gurgi is the friend and companion to the beautiful Princess Eilonwy, whom Taran naturally falls madly in love with, but can never touch – curse his commoner’s blood! And he soon meets the obnoxious Prince Ellidyr, third borne son of a minor king and a rival for the Princess’s affections, who is quick to remind him of this fact.
Exterior – Spiral Castle – Daytime (Animation)
Taran, Eilonwy, Ellidyr, and Gurgi sneak into the diabolical Spiral Castle. Clips change in accordance with the voiceover descriptions.
(Image source “andreasdeja.blogspot.com”)
Larry (V.O.)
Taran finds out that Prince Gwydion has led an army to besiege Spiral Castle, where the feared Horned King, a boisterous, brutal Viking, is using the titular Cauldron to summon armies of the dead. Not content to wait out the siege, the four decide that they should sneak into the castle and steal the cauldron themselves, thus becoming heroes. They sneak past the inevitably distracted guards to the cauldron room, but the cauldron is gone. Instead, Creeper, the Horned King’s loyal and incontinence-inducing goblin minion, finds them and they are all captured, except for Gurgi, who escapes through a hole in the wall.
Interior – Dungeons and Queen Achren’s Laboratory (Animation)
We see Queen Achren interacting with Eilonwy. It cuts later to the dungeon and other locations in keeping with the voiceover.
Larry (V.O.)
So, while Taran and Ellidyr are sent to the dungeon, where they will share a dank cell with the King-turned-bard-turned-comic-relief Fflewddur Fflam, Eilonwy is taken instead to the seductively evil Queen Achren, who gave many an 11-to-13-year-old boy strange feelings they couldn’t explain. The way she, erm, interacted with Eilonwy apparently also gave a certain subset of 11-to-13-year-old girls some strange feelings they couldn’t explain, too, which caught the attention of moral guardians of the time and made Queen A. the lesbian icon she remains to this day. Queen A. wants to teach Eilonwy the dark magical arts as her new apprentice, but Eilonwy resists her…let’s say professional interest. Gurgi later breaks Eilonwy out and leads her through the secret tunnels he found. She insists they go rescue their friends from the dungeon.
Interior – Spiral Castle – Horned King’s Room (Animation)
Eilonwy and Gurgi look through a hidden spy hole into the room of the Viking-like Horned King, who has a crystal ball. He then transforms in a scary sequence into the spectral, skeletal Arawan, Death-Lord, and summons the image of three witches on the crystal ball.
(Image source “cafans.b-cdn.net”)
Larry (V.O.)
Along the way they witness a diaper-as-a-prerequisite-for-viewing transformation scene, where the Horned King is revealed to be Arawan, the Death Lord, and Skeletor’s long-lost cousin. We find out that the three witches who own the cauldron have taken it back since his “time ran out” with it. He then reveals to the witches the MacGuffin-swine Hen Wen in a cage and offers the psychic pig in exchange for another turn with the cauldron. Knowing that she needs to stop both of these actions, Eilonwy sends Gurgi to rescue the boys while she sneaks in and steals back Hen Wen.
Interior – Spiral Castle – Dungeons (Animation)
Scenes below the castle are shown in succession.
Larry (V.O.)
Gurgi breaks out Taran, Ellidyr, and the Fflam Man and they meet back up with Eilonwy, who holds Hen Wen, but the alarm is sounded. Soon they’re all backed into a crypt deep below the castle by cauldron born undead. Ellidyr tries unsuccessfully to fight them off with a rusty sword he found, but the blade does no harm to them. Meanwhile Taran, looking for his own weapon, finds the corpse of a dead king holding a sword and yanks it from the deathly grip. The sword is magic as fuck and he’s able to destroy the undead with it, finally the warrior he always wanted to be. But there are too many of them, so Gurgi leads them even deeper below the castle to a circle of ancient standing stones, which the castle was apparently built upon. He leads then between the stones and through a mystical doorway of mid ‘80s computer animation and into the magical land of the fairies to their escape.
Exterior – Fairy Land – Perpetual Twilight (Animation)
The five heroes encounter various mystical, and slightly sinister, elves, fairies, sprites, and other fair folk.
Brian Froud Faeries (Image source "capilanou.ca")
Larry (V.O.)
So, it’s off to fairyland, so now we can finally hang with Tink and friends and escape the nightmare juice for a moment, right? WRONG! These are Brian Froud fairies! You thought Gurgi and Creeper are nightmare juice? Well here comes jolly ol’ King Eiddileg and his merry band of child-stealing, milk-curdling little monsters, all deliberately made over by the Uncanny Valley School of Beauty. These creepy bits of old Dark Age terror inform the heroes that not only must Arawan not reclaim the cauldron, but the witches must never claim Hen Wen or bad shit goes down. The “fair folk” agree to protect the little piggy that caused it all and to return it to Taran’s boss Dalban the Enchanter if the heroes are willing to destroy the cauldron. King Exposition of Fairyland then tells our heroes that they can find the witches and the cauldron in the Marshes of Morva.
Exterior – Marshes of Morva – Nighttime (Animation)
The five heroes wander the marsh and encounter the three witches, Orddu, Orwen and Orgoch.
(Image source “andreasdeja.blogspot.com”)
Larry (V.O.)
So, now our heroes travel to the Marshes of Morva where they encounter the three…OHMYHOLYFUCKINSHIT!!! GHAAA!! My kingdom for a Xanax!! Ahem…they now encounter the terror of the witches three, nightmare juice squeezed from your finest baby tears. Despite some “humor” with Orwen flirting with the Fflamster, the scene is creepy as fuck. They are told by the witches that they can have the cauldron, but the witches will need something in return. Orddu suggests Hen Wen, for example, but no sell. Flamboni offers his magic harp and Eilonwy a vaguely magical broach. But no, the Gods of Symbolism demand that Taran sacrifice his newfound magic sword and with it his symbolic warriorhood, which he reluctantly does. But the witches three warn that the only way to destroy the cauldron is for a living mortal to willingly sacrifice their own life by diving into it.
Exterior – Wilderness and Spiral Castle – Dawn (Animation)
The five heroes drag the eponymous cauldron, but are attacked by Gwythaints.
(Image source “auctionzip.com”)
Larry (V.O.)
Aaannnnd naturally they fuck it all up, as Arawan spies on them all through his crystal ball of plot device and sends his dragon-like Gwythaints to attack them. They do and soon the Cauldron of McGuffin is off once again to Castle Grayskull, err, the Spiral Castle. Our heroes now return to the castle, where the siege has turned hot and the forces of Prince Gwydion are overrunning the battlements, defeating the remaining mostly human guards, Enchanter Dalben is even there to vanquish the remaining cauldron born zombies with some computer-aided mystical Laser Floyd effects. Victory seems assured for our heroic Prince when the Gwythaints bring back the cauldron, so the many dead can rise once again to join the armies of Arawan.
Interior – The Cauldron Room (Animation)
The five heroes reenter the castle and get to the cauldron room. In a spectacular animation and effects scene, Arawan uses the magic of the cauldron and the dead come back to life and engage, and kill, the living soldiers on both sides, who also rise as cauldron born.
Larry (V.O.)
The five heroes break back into the castle just in time for Arawan aka the Horned King to use the dark magic to summon more of the cauldron born zombies in a scene brought to you by the makers of Diazepam. Soon it’s dead men walking and…ah! The blood! The bones! AH! AH! Ahhnyway, in the ensuing fight to recapture the cauldron, or at least end the ceremony, Ellidyr is stabbed by a zombie and…ah! More blood! So much blood!! Now Taran, knowing someone has to stop this, makes the decision to dive into the cauldron and sacrifice himself. He is stopped by the dying Ellidyr, who, after spending most of the film mocking Taran’s low birth, surprises Taran by knighting him on the spot as the zombies graciously wait out the ceremony and then does a swan dive into the cauldron himself, the first non-villain main character death in a Disney movie since Bambi’s Mom, if I recall. His sacrifice causes the cauldron to crack and shoot magic flames that engulf and consume Arawan, and cause all the zombies to crumble into dust. The love triangle terminally resolved, Gurgi arranges for events to allow Eilonwy and now-Sir Taran, to kiss. And we have our…happy ending?
Interior – Larry’s Study
Larry is back at his desk.
Larry
The Black Cauldron debuted in late November of 1984 and thereby became Burton’s other “Nightmare before Christmas”. The movie got positive reviews and debuted at number one at the box office, just beating out the craptacular Supergirl. After a promising opening weekend, however, attendance dropped like a rock. Despite the studio working hard in their marketing campaign to make it clear that this movie was, duh, not appropriate for younger children, news stories proliferated of parents dragging their terrified tots out of theaters. There were even a few lawsuits, all dismissed since, double duh, PG rated movie back when that meant something. That one’s on you, Mama Jones! It was looking like Disney animation was about to have its first bomb since Fantasia. But then, [angelic music plays] a Christmas miracle happened. Attendance started ticking back up. It seems that there truly is no such thing as bad publicity, because soon stupid, macho-wannabe 8-12 year old boys like me were dragging our parents to see this 90-minute SSRI advertisement because we were Big Boys, brave and strong, dammit, and no, I wasn’t scared by the skeletons and witches, you were! And if my eyes are red it’s because I was up all night past my bedtime because I’m a rebel, not because I was screaming that skeletons were going to eat me in my sleep, no way!!
Larry sits back, pretending to cry for a moment.
Larry
And yet – are you detecting a pattern, folks? – it could have been even scarier! Some leaked concept art portrays some pants-shittingly gruesome images of the living becoming the living dead by their flesh bubbling, rotting, and blistering away.
For a brief second, highlighted by a scream effect, some of this concept art is flashed on the screen.
Larry
Apparently, even the man who brought you cute little Muppets having their very souls ripped from them by the Dark Crystal, and who somehow felt that Brian Froud and Tim Burton were the right call for designing a Disney cartoon, though this was too much. [break] The Black Cauldron ultimately made a cool $50 million or so at the international box office[1], doing much better overseas than in the US. It thereby either made a fair profit or it barely broke even, depending on how you count the costs to make it. The film represents a unique period in Disney animation. Ron Miller was pushing for a more adult, mature image for Disney. New Chief Creative Officer Jim Henson, creator of The Dark Crystal and your psychiatrist’s best friend, was also trying to shed his kid-friendly “Muppets” image. And simultaneous to all of this was the backdrop of an attempted corporate takeover which may well have led to some of the darker themes staying in. Should you see it? Yes, with other grown up adults, in the daytime with all the lights on. It’s unique among the Disney anima-canon, stylistically singular, and thematically unlike nearly anything else in Disney’s anima-canon. Watch it, and be sure to forward your therapy bills to Brian Froud and Tim Burton. [beat] So, you did it, you wasted another good quarter hour of your life and ran your therapy bills back up with me as I demonstrated once again why “Nostalgia was Way Better when I was a Kid”. Come back next week for a new video, this time about the Dan Ackroyd and Eddie Murphy comedy Ghostbusters, a 90-minute ghost story that’s still far less terror inducing than good old Walt Disney from the same year. And, as always…pleasant dreams!
[Theme music plays and video ends]
[1] Notably better than in our timeline, but hardly a major blockbuster and far below Ron Miller’s dreams of reinvigorating Disney Animation. Having a unique look and a central guiding vision has produced a “better” picture, but the dark, un-Disneylike tone is still holding it back. It will be another “cult classic” in this timeline, the “unappreciated gem” for many. It will be remembered for being an early cinematic look at Tim Burton.