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Show . '': ,.,r ... ' HA' . ( w I' 0 O f Left to right: Stephen Geoffreys, William Ragsdale and Amanda Bearse are average teenagers who suspect the charming newcomer to town (played by Chris Saradon) is a vampire in "Fright Night." Big Bird's movie flies right for tots, older kids wing it with 'Fright' vampire , Quickies by llick Itrough Follow That Bird "Follow That Bird" will be a treat for "Sesame Street" fans, but for the rest of us, the goings-on might seem a bit too mild, or even treacly. The beginning is just right (as Goldilocks might say if she were in the audience). During a typical happy day on "Sesame Street," Big Bird is approached by Miss Finch, of the Society of Feathered Friends, who offers to place him with a family "of your own kind." Big Bird accepts, thinking he will live with a wonderful family of big yellow fowl. But when he travels to Illinois, he is placed with the Dodos, who can barely remember how to inhale and exhale. ( In a well-judged satirical nip, the dullard Dodo children are named Donny and Marie. ) Big Bird even has to change his name to Big Dodo. This is a nice opening that takes you into Big's innocent winsome world view. It's funny and heartbreaking at the same time. The picture becomes more routine when he leaves the Dodos, resolved to find his way cross-country back to Sesame Street. Along the way he meets nice people (two farm children) and some not so nice Sam and Sid , Sleaze (Dave Thomas, JoeJ Flaherty), who trap him in a carnival where he's painted and exhibited as the Blue Bird of Happiness. Meanwhile, his Sesame Street friends search for him. Bert and Ernie buzz the country in a plane. Another group is in a Volkswagen, which is being eaten bit by bit by the voracious Cookie Monster. Big Bird's sweet, hokey-pokey character is portrayed as always by Carroll Spinney, who has a movie to himself now, after making cameo appearances in the Muppet films. He is enjoyable to very young children, . i .in some unexpected twists. Those surprises we'll leave you to find for yourself among the goodies in "Fright Night." The Black Cauldron "Cauldron" shows all the meticulous meticu-lous Disney artistry in cartooning, but the plot looks like a Xerox of all the sword-and-sorcery movies of recent years, and in particular the Muppets' "Dark Crystal." The Cauldron is the trapped spirit of an evil wizard, and whoever possesses it can call forth the dead warriors from all the wars ever fought. The Horned King is the bad guy after the Cauldron. The hero, young Taran, takes care of a mystical pig named Henwyn whose powers could be used by the king to located the Cauldron. Taran is accompanied by a beautiful princess and a fussy minstrel with a magic lute (a string on his instrument breaks every time he tells a lie.) But most of these characters aren't memorable. The young heroes look like they come out of the same mold that's been used since Disney did "Sword in the Stone." The most original character is Gurgi, a mongrel t elf with - a great ' voice l; characterization from' 'John Byner, who is part Munchkin, part Donald Duck. "Cauldron" has some delightful scenes but not enough to lift it out of the ordinary. k A Classic Recommended Good double feature material Time-killer For masochists only Now Showing At the Holiday Village Cinemas : ' 2Back to the Future Fright Night Mad Max : Beyond Thunderdome Summer Rental Volunteers (Not yet rated) but might wear thin after a while for older folk. Guest stars like Flaherty, Thomas and John Candy are here for the adults, but generally they're not as well done as the puppet characters. Two surprises: The Muppet character Miss Finch is voiced by Sally Kellerman, and "Saturday Night" alumnus Laraine Newman does the voice of Mrs . Dodo. Fright Night - What's scarier than seeing, from . i , your, bedroom window, that the k neighbor next door is a vampire who bites young women? How about if the vampire notices that you're watching him? "Dracula" meets "Rear Window"! Charley Brewster (William Ragsdale) already has his suspicions aroused when the neighbor moves in with a coffin and sexy young women go into the house and never come out. (They do, however, show up on the evening news as the latest victims of a mysterious wave of killings . ) But Charley can't convince anyone of the danger not his dizzy mother, the police, his girlfriend (Amanda Bearse) or his giggly buddy (Stephen Geoffreys), who jokes that the vampire is going to "suck his way through the entire town." Finally, he ends up asking help from the host (Roddy McDowall) of his favorite late-night horror program, who's just been fired because his vampire movies are old hat. The writer-director, Tom Holland, has created a great campfire story. Along with some humorous touches, he has added all the old-fashioned juicy touches wolves howling, a full moon and fog oozing out of an old house. Also commendable are the two or three scenes, filmed from a bats'-eye-view, of the vampire swooping down on his prey. Best of all, Holland has two spooky ' villains. Chris Sarandon is one of the all-time .best vampires. He knows Bela Lugosi techniques don't work anymore; he's more a courtly version of Mr. Goodbar. n i And Jonathan Stark nearly v matches him in a smaller role, as -the retainer who presides over the house during the day. He has a great way of using his lips and eyes to ask, "You wanna try something, kid?" The only major problem is that the vampires turn too much into elaborate mechanical effects toward the end of the movie. William Ragsdale tensely plays the hero facing a supernatural version of an adolescent nightmare how do you alert others when only you can see the evil of an affable-seeming adult? McDowall is fun as the ham actor playing vampire-killer for real. And Stephen Geoffreys is good in a role that takes |
