In the early days of his career, Wolfgagng Petersen (director of Air Force One, The Perfect Storm and Troy) showed some of his flair for enjoyable story-telling and technical bravura with this decent kid's fantasy flick. Based on a mammoth novel by Michael Ende, and blessed with a budget that at the time was the biggest ever approved for a non-American, non-Russian film, the pic has a good deal of invention and imagination on show. While the plethora of characters and adventures has been dramatically cut down from the book in order to keep the film's length sensible, there's still enough going on to create a fairly compelling story.
A young bullied school-kid named Bastian (Barret Oliver) is pursued by a gang whilst heading for school, so he takes refuge in a dusty antiquarian bookshop. Here he comes into possession of a magical old book called The Neverending Story. By the time he gets to school he is running pretty late for his lessons, so rather than facing the wrath of his teacher Bastian hides in a cluttered storage attic and begins to read his new story. The story is all about a fantasy world named Fantasia, ruled by a gravely ill empress (Tami Stronach), which is being rapidly swallowed-up by a devastating force known - ominously - as "The Nothing". The empress sends a brave young adventurer, Atreyu (Noah Hathaway), to find a way to save the kingdom from "The Nothing". But the more Bastian reads the book, following Atreyu through a series of remarkable adventures, the more he realises that the story may not be quite the work of fiction he presumed it to be. Indeed, he seems to be drawn closer to an alternative dimension in which the events of the book actually become real-life events.
The story is very appealing for anyone who has ever envisaged themselves being IN one of their favourite books. If you've ever fantasised that you're Jim Hawkins in "Treasure Island", or Frodo in "The Lord Of The Rings", or Charlie in "Charlie And The Chocolate Factory", this film will probably strike a chord with your imagination. The young actors do reasonably well with their big roles (they are expected to carry the film, much more so than the adult actors, and they do so quite competently). The special effects are more than passable for a 1984 movie, with some interesting visual trickery and an amusing gallery of monsters and creatures, both friendly and hostile. As a fan of the book, I hoped for rather more of the story to make it into the film version but it basically only concerns itself with the first third of the novel - which is disappointing but understandable. However, for those who enjoy stories set in fantastical realms with outlandish characters and plenty of mythical adventures, The Neverending Story is definitely a pleasant time-filler.
A young bullied school-kid named Bastian (Barret Oliver) is pursued by a gang whilst heading for school, so he takes refuge in a dusty antiquarian bookshop. Here he comes into possession of a magical old book called The Neverending Story. By the time he gets to school he is running pretty late for his lessons, so rather than facing the wrath of his teacher Bastian hides in a cluttered storage attic and begins to read his new story. The story is all about a fantasy world named Fantasia, ruled by a gravely ill empress (Tami Stronach), which is being rapidly swallowed-up by a devastating force known - ominously - as "The Nothing". The empress sends a brave young adventurer, Atreyu (Noah Hathaway), to find a way to save the kingdom from "The Nothing". But the more Bastian reads the book, following Atreyu through a series of remarkable adventures, the more he realises that the story may not be quite the work of fiction he presumed it to be. Indeed, he seems to be drawn closer to an alternative dimension in which the events of the book actually become real-life events.
The story is very appealing for anyone who has ever envisaged themselves being IN one of their favourite books. If you've ever fantasised that you're Jim Hawkins in "Treasure Island", or Frodo in "The Lord Of The Rings", or Charlie in "Charlie And The Chocolate Factory", this film will probably strike a chord with your imagination. The young actors do reasonably well with their big roles (they are expected to carry the film, much more so than the adult actors, and they do so quite competently). The special effects are more than passable for a 1984 movie, with some interesting visual trickery and an amusing gallery of monsters and creatures, both friendly and hostile. As a fan of the book, I hoped for rather more of the story to make it into the film version but it basically only concerns itself with the first third of the novel - which is disappointing but understandable. However, for those who enjoy stories set in fantastical realms with outlandish characters and plenty of mythical adventures, The Neverending Story is definitely a pleasant time-filler.