Return from Witch Mountain (1978)

I was pleasantly surprised by the first installment of the Witch Mountain series, meaning that I had higher expectations for its sequel. With the two leads coming back, I was prepared for more fun and more development of these characters and their story. While Tia (Kim Richards) and Tony (Ike Eisenmann) were still the main focus of the film, director (John Hough) and writer (Malcolm Marmorstein) made the decision to separate the two throughout nearly the entire film and the production suffered as a result. Part of what made Escape to Witch Mountain (1975) a success was the chemistry that the two young actors had with one another and Eddie Albert (Jason). They were not given the opportunity to work as closely as they had in the previous film and Albert’s character was not present in the film. The actors cast in this film did not have the same connection with the two protagonists due to the fact that they majority of the other actors lacked enough talent to even properly portray their own characters. The Earthquake Gang, which consisted of Rocky (Jeffrey Jacquet), Crusher (Poindexter Yothers), Muscles (Brad Savage) and Dazzler (Christian Juttner), combined for next to no acting ability (not to mention Jack Soo who is possibly one of the worst actors ever to appear on the big screen). Nothing about their performance was convincing and it seemed that each and every line was forced. Their lack of talent appeared to leave Richards stranded and unable to perform to the best of her ability. As if the acting wasn’t enough to ruin the film, the story itself lacked in nearly every way compared to the first film. The darker themes of the first film were much of what made it so appealing to its audiences; themes including kidnapping, emotional abuse and bullying drove a story of love and success and allowed the film to be as enjoyable as it was. Themes in this film were greed, violence and world domination. While these themes have the potential to produce a lot of fun, they were essentially empty, served no purpose and ultimately led to nothing. It could be said that the film lacked a definitive story and because of this it was terribly difficult to watch. The one positive in all of this was that Disney, once again, managed to deliver on special effects and this managed to relieve some of the discomfort that the film caused. This film was utterly disappointing and lacked nearly everything necessary for success. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078158/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1