Hocus Pocus (1993 film)

Hocus Pocus
Theatrical release poster by Drew Struzan
Directed by	Kenny Ortega
Produced by	David Kirschner Steven Haft
Screenplay by	Mick Garris Neil Cuthbert
Story by	David Kirschner Mick Garris
Starring	Bette Midler Sarah Jessica Parker Kathy Najimy Omri Katz Thora Birch Vinessa Shaw
Music by	John Debney
Cinematography	Hiro Narita
Edited by	Peter E. Berger
Production company	Walt Disney Pictures
Distributed by	Buena Vista Pictures
Release dates	July 16, 1993 (1993-07-16) (US) March 31, 1994 (1994-03-31) (Australia) October 8, 1994 (1994-10-08) (Japan)
Running time	96 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$28 million
Box office	$39.5 million

Hocus Pocus is a 1993 American comedy fantasy film directed by Kenny Ortega, and stars Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy as a trio of witches, the Sanderson Sisters, who are inadvertently resurrected by a cynical teenager, his younger sister and girlfriend in Salem, Massachusetts. The film received mostly negative reviews from critics during its theatrical release but became a cult film.

Plot

On October 31, 1693, in Salem, Massachusetts, Thackery Binx discovers his younger sister Emily being spirited away to the cottage of the Sanderson sisters, a trio of witches. The sisters, Winifred, Sarah and Mary, cast a spell on Emily to absorb her youth and regain their own, killing Emily. Binx confronts them, but the witches transform him into an immortal black cat to live with his guilt. The townsfolk, led by Binx's father, capture and hang the witches, but Winifred's spellbook casts a curse that will resurrect the witches on All Hallows Eve when a virgin lights the Black Flame Candle. Binx remains guarding the cottage to ensure no one summons the witches.

Three hundred years later, Max Dennison uncomfortably moves from Los Angeles to Salem with his family. While enjoying their time, Max and his little sister Dani, an enthusiastic trick-or-treater, wander into the house of their friend Allison, whose family owns the Sanderson cottage, now a museum. Max suggests going to the cottage to impress Allison and to "make a believer" out of him, though a scared Dani objects until Max promises to take her trick-or-treating properly the following year as Peter Pan and Wendy (in tights).

Investigating inside the cottage, Max lights the Black Flame Candle and inadvertently resurrects the witches, who plot to continue their plan to suck out the souls of all of Salem's children, beginning with Dani. The children escape, while Max steals Winifred's spell book on advice from the talking Binx. The witches pursue them to a cemetery, where Winifred raises her unfaithful lover Billy Butcherson as a zombie to chase them on foot. The witches try to acclimate to the 20th century, but are horrified when they discover that Halloween has become a holiday, and their broomsticks are stolen by three girls. Winifred reminds them that they must achieve their goals before sunrise or they will be disintegrated. They pursue the children across town using Mary's enhanced sense of smell. Max, Allison and Dani find their parents at a Halloween party at the town hall, where Winifred enchants the partygoers to literally dance until they die. The children lure the witches to the high school, where they trap them in a kiln to burn them alive. While the children assume the sisters are dead, the witches' own curse revives them, and they kidnap Dani and Binx after Max and Allison open the spellbook. Sarah then uses her siren-like vocals to hypnotize Salem's children and lure them to the Sandersons' cottage. Max and Allison rescue Dani and Binx by tricking the witches into believing sunrise came an hour early.

Back at the cemetery, Max runs into Billy, who cuts open his stitched up mouth and insults Winifred, joining Max to protect Dani. The witches attack, and Winifred captures Dani to suck out her soul with the single vial of potion she retrieved from her cauldron. Binx leaps on Winifred and knocks the potion out of her hand into Max's, but Binx is thrown to the ground and mortally wounded. Rather than smashing the vial, Max drinks it and apparently makes himself a sacrifice, causing Winifred to let go of Dani and attempts to suck out his soul, but a brief struggle ends up knocking them both back to the ground. Having stepped on hallowed ground, Winifred is petrified. The sun rises, causing the witches to disintegrate. A satisfied Billy returns to his grave. Binx dies and his soul is finally freed. He thanks Max, Dani and Allison for their help, and kisses Dani on the cheek, promising to always be with her. Binx reunites with Emily and they walk into the afterlife together.

With the witches dead, the enchanted partygoers, including Max and Dani's parents, are shown released from their spell and left exhausted and oblivious of their situation. Meanwhile, Winifred's spellbook, left behind in the witches' cottage, opens its eye to seek its master, hinting that the Sanderson sisters may return once again.

Cast

The Sanderson Sisters

• Bette Midler as Winifred "Winnie" Sanderson, the leader of the Sanderson sisters.
• Kathy Najimy as Mary Sanderson
• Sarah Jessica Parker as Sarah Sanderson

Main cast

• Omri Katz as Max Dennison
• Thora Birch as Dani Dennison, Max's younger sister
• Vinessa Shaw as Allison, Max's love interest and native Salem resident
• Sean Murray as Thackery Binx; originally a teenager from 1693, he follows his little sister Emily into the woods, where he fails to prevent her death at the hands of the Sanderson sisters. The witches then transform him into an immortal cat, voiced by Jason Marsden.
• Doug Jones as Billy Butcherson; Winifred's lover (now a zombie)
• Charles Rocket as Dave Dennison, Max and Dani's father
• Stephanie Faracy as Jenny Dennison, Max and Dani's mother

Other cast

• Amanda Shepherd as Emily Binx, Thackery's sister
• Larry Bagby as Ernie / "Ice", the leader of a group of high school delinquents
• Tobias Jelinek as Jay, another delinquent and Ernie's friend
• Steve Voboril as Elijah, a boy from a farm in 1693
• Norbert Weisser as Mr. Binx, Emily and Thackery's father
• Kathleen Freeman as Miss Olin, Max's and Allison's teacher at Jacob Bailey High School
• Garry Marshall (uncredited) as "The Devil", a man wearing a devil costume whom the Sanderson sisters assume to be their "Master."
• Penny Marshall (uncredited) as the "Devil's" wife. The sisters assume that she is Medusa due to her curlers, which resemble snakes.

Production

In the 1994 TV documentary Hocus Pocus: Begin the Magic, and on the film's Blu-ray release, producer David Kirschner said he came up with the idea for the film one night. He and his young daughter were sitting outside and his neighbor's black cat strayed by. Kirschner invented a tale of how the cat was once a boy who was changed into a feline three hundred years ago by three witches.

Hocus Pocus started life as a script for a special original film for the Disney Channel, to be produced by one of the smaller studios owned by The Walt Disney Company. The script, however, caught the eye of Walt Disney Studios, who decided that the film was strong enough to carry well-known names and to attract a cinema audience. The idea to cast Bette Midler was partly inspired by Midler's Golden Globe-nominated performance in a milestone motion picture for The Walt Disney Company on its Touchstone Pictures line, Down and Out in Beverly Hills. Midler, who plays the central antagonist of the film, is quoted as saying that "Hocus Pocus was the most fun I'd had in my career up to that point."

This film is set in Salem, Massachusetts, but most of it was shot on sound stages in Burbank, California. However, its daytime scenes were filmed in Salem and Marblehead, Massachusetts during two weeks of filming with principal cast.

Music

Main article: Hocus Pocus (soundtrack)

The musical score for Hocus Pocus was composed and conducted by John Debney. James Horner was originally slated to score the film, but became unavailable at the last minute, so Debney had to score the entire film in two weeks. Even though he didn't score the film, Horner came back to write the theme for Sarah (sung by Sarah Jessica Parker more commonly known as "Come Little Children") which is featured in Intrada's Complete Edition of the score.

Debney released a promotional score through the internet containing 19 tracks from the film. Bootlegs were subsequently released across the internet, primarily because the promotional release missed the entire opening sequence music.

Songs

Songs are adapted from the film's end credits.

• "Sarah's Theme" - music by James Horner; lyrics by Brock Walsh; performed by Sarah Jessica Parker
• "I Put a Spell on You" - written by Jay Hawkins and produced and arranged by Marc Shaiman; performed by Bette Midler
• "Witchcraft" - written by Cy Coleman, Carolyn Leigh; performed by Joe Malone
• "I Put a Spell on You" - written by Jay Hawkins; performed by Joe Malone
• "Sabre Dance" - written by George Wilson
• Chants and Incantations - conceived and written by Brock Walsh

Release

Hocus Pocus was released in the United States and Canada on July 16, 1993, opening in fourth place with $8.1 million. Following a sophomore gross of $5.2 million, the film fell out of the top ten, ending its domestic box office run with $39.5 million. The film was released to foreign markets in October 1994.

Home media and television

The film was released to VHS in North America on September 9, 1994, and later to DVD on June 4, 2002. Following the film's release on the latter format, it has continued to show strong annual sales, raking in more than $1 million in DVD sales each October. In the mid to late 1990s, the film was rebroadcast annually on ABC and Disney Channel before switching over to ABC Family's 13 Nights of Halloween lineup in the early 2000s. The film has continuously brought record viewing numbers to the lineup, including a 2009 broadcast watched by 2.5 million viewers. In 2011, an October 29 airing became the lineup's most watched program, with 2.8 million viewers.

On September 4, 2012, the film was released on Blu-ray.

Reception

The film received mixed-to-negative reviews from film critics, though reception has grown to be more warm towards the film. Today, it is seen as a cult classic. On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, Hocus Pocus has a "Rotten" score of 30%, based on 43 reviews; however, the audience score is a "fresh" 70%, with an average rating of 3.1 stars out of 5. The Miami Herald called it "a pretty lackluster affair", adding this comment: "Despite the triple-threat actress combo, Hocus Pocus won't be the Sister Act of 1993. There are a lot of gotta-sees this summer, and this isn't one of them." The New York Times' Janet Maslin wrote that the film "has flashes of visual stylishness but virtually no grip on its story". Ty Burr of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a C-, calling it "acceptable scary-silly kid fodder that adults will find only mildly insulting. Unless they're Bette Midler fans. In which case it's depressing as hell"; and stating that while Najimy and Parker "have their moments of ramshackle comic inspiration, and the passable special effects should keep younger campers transfixed [...] the sight of the Divine Miss M. mugging her way through a cheesy supernatural kiddie comedy is, to say the least, dispiriting."

Legacy

Midler dressed as Winifred Sanderson during her Divine Intervention Tour.

Over the years, through various outlets such as strong DVD sales and annual record-breaking showings on ABC Family's 13 Nights of Halloween, the film has achieved cult status. Various media outlets such as Celebuzz and Oh No They Didn't have reiterated such claims. In October 2011, the Houston Symphony celebrated various horror and Halloween classics, including Hocus Pocus, with "The Hocus Pocus Pops."

On October 19, 2013, D23 held a special screening of Hocus Pocus at the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California, to honor the 20th anniversary of the film. Nine of the cast and crew gathered for the screening, and hundreds of D23 members attended. Returning members included Kathy Najimy, David Kirschner, Thora Birch, Doug Jones, Vinessa Shaw, and Omri Katz.

During her Divine Intervention Tour, Bette Midler appeared on stage dressed as Winifred Sanderson. Her Harlettes appeared with her dressed as Mary and Sarah, and the three of them performed the film's version of "I Put a Spell on You".

On September 15, 2015, the Hocus Pocus Villain Spelltacular was introduced at the Magic Kingdom as a part of Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party. The show introduces new actresses as the Sanderson Sisters, who try to make a villain party and summon or attract various Disney villains in the process.

Sequel

In July 2014, it was announced that Disney was developing a supernatural-themed film about witches, and that Tina Fey was on board as a producer and star. However, Deadline debunked rumors that the film was a sequel to Hocus Pocus.

Bette Midler said she is ready and willing to return. She also says her co-stars Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy are interested in reprising the roles of the Sanderson sisters as well. Disney has yet to greenlight any sequel.

In November 2015, Midler stated in a Facebook Q&A that "after all these years and all the fan demand, I do believe I can stand and firmly say an unequivocal no" in response to a question about a sequel.

Accolades

Year	Association	Category	Recipient	Result
1994	Saturn Awards	Best Actress	Bette Midler	Nominated
		Best Supporting Actress	Kathy Najimy	Nominated
			Sarah Jessica Parker	Nominated
		Best Fantasy Film	Hocus Pocus	Nominated
		Best Special Effects	Hocus Pocus	Nominated
		Best Costumes	Hocus Pocus	Won
	Young Artist Awards	Best Youth Actress Leading Role in a Motion Picture Comedy	Thora Birch	Won
		Best Youth Actress Leading Role in a Motion Picture Comedy	Vinessa Shaw	Nominated
		Best Youth Actor Leading Role in a Motion Picture Comedy	Omri Katz	Nominated
		Best Youth Actor Leading Role in a Motion Picture Comedy	Sean Murray	Nominated
		Best Youth Actor in a Voice Over Role - TV or Movie	Jason Marsden	Nominated

See also

• List of American films of 1993

External links

• Official website
• Hocus Pocus at IMDb
• Hocus Pocus at Box Office Mojo
• Hocus Pocus at Rotten Tomatoes