# Labyrinth - Work: Film - Date: 1986 (U.S., June 27) - Canonical: https://www.lanternhall.org/works/labyrinth-film/ > Jim Henson's goblin fairy tale: a teenage girl, thirteen hours, a maze of talking doors and Escher staircases, and David Bowie's glittering, menacing Goblin King. **Why it matters:** A box-office failure that became one of the great cult fantasies, it fused Henson's puppetry, Brian Froud's faerie designs and Bowie's music, and pointed toward the digital future with the first realistic CGI animal on film. ## Quick answers **When was Labyrinth first released?** Labyrinth was first released in 1986 (U.S., June 27). **What kind of work is Labyrinth?** Labyrinth is a film in the Fantasy Film, Fairy-Tale Fantasy and Portal Fantasy tradition. **Why is Labyrinth important?** A box-office failure that became one of the great cult fantasies, it fused Henson's puppetry, Brian Froud's faerie designs and Bowie's music, and pointed toward the digital future with the first realistic CGI animal on film. ## Overview *Labyrinth* is a fairy tale about growing up, told with puppets, glam rock and a maze. Directed by Jim Henson and released in the United States by TriStar Pictures on June 27, 1986, it sends a sixteen-year-old girl, Sarah Williams (Jennifer Connelly), into a world of [goblins](https://www.lanternhall.org/bestiary/goblin/) and talking stones to rescue the baby half-brother she carelessly wished away. Waiting at the center is Jareth, the Goblin King, played by David Bowie, who also wrote and performed five songs for the film. The film flopped on release, earning about $12.9 million in the U.S. against a $25 million budget, and the failure wounded Henson deeply. Yet it found its audience on home video and television, and today it is one of the most beloved cult fantasies of the 1980s, a touchstone of [Fairy-Tale Fantasy](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/fairy-tale-fantasy/) and [Portal Fantasy](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/portal-fantasy/) on screen. ## Origins *Labyrinth* grew out of Henson's partnership with the English illustrator Brian Froud, the conceptual designer of their 1982 film *The Dark Crystal*. Froud had become famous with *Faeries* (1978), the illustrated book he created with [Alan Lee](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/alan-lee/), and his mossy, mischievous goblins set the tone for the new project. The children's poet Dennis Lee wrote an early story treatment with Henson, and Terry Jones of Monty Python wrote the screenplay, which then passed through the hands of Laura Phillips, Elaine May and George Lucas. Jones ultimately received sole credit, though he later said, "I didn't feel that it was very much mine." Lucas served as executive producer, with Lucasfilm co-producing alongside Henson Associates and Eric Rattray as producer. Filming ran from April to September 1985, largely at Elstree Studios in England, with the cinematographer Alex Thomson, who had shot [Excalibur](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/excalibur-film/). The film's creatures were built by Henson's workshop, from the grumpy [Dwarf](https://www.lanternhall.org/bestiary/dwarf/) Hoggle to the gentle giant Ludo and the fox-terrier knight Sir Didymus. The opening titles featured a barn owl animated by computer, cited as the first realistic CGI animal in a feature film. ## The story Sarah is a daydreaming teenager who resents babysitting her infant half-brother, Toby. Acting out lines from a storybook called *The Labyrinth*, she wishes the goblins would take him away, and they do. Jareth appears and offers her a bargain: she has thirteen hours to solve his labyrinth and reach his castle beyond the Goblin City, or Toby will become a goblin forever. The maze keeps changing its rules. Walls hide openings, a pair of door-knockers argue, and two guards pose a logic puzzle about which door tells the truth. Sarah gains three allies: Hoggle, a cowardly dwarf in Jareth's employ; Ludo, a huge shaggy beast who can summon rocks; and Sir Didymus, a tiny knight who rides a sheepdog. Jareth tempts and hinders her, most memorably with a drugged peach that plunges her into a dreamlike masquerade ball. In the end Sarah confronts the Goblin King alone in a castle of impossible, gravity-defying staircases. She remembers the final line of her book, "You have no power over me!" and the spell breaks. She wakes at home with Toby safe, and her companions from the labyrinth reappear in her bedroom mirror, still her friends. ## Reception & impact The release was a disappointment. *Labyrinth* opened at No. 8 in the U.S. with about $3.5 million from 1,141 theaters and finished with $12.9 million domestically; worldwide receipts have been reported at a little over $34 million. Roger Ebert gave it two stars, writing that it "never really comes alive," and Gene Siskel was harsher still. Others admired the effects and craft; in *The New York Times*, Nina Darnton noted how closely the plot resembled Maurice Sendak's *Outside Over There*. The failure hit Henson hard. His son Brian later said it was the closest he had seen his father come to "turning in on himself and getting quite depressed." It was the last feature film Henson directed before his death in 1990. Even so, the film was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and for a BAFTA for special visual effects. ## Legacy Home video changed everything. Through the late 1980s and 1990s *Labyrinth* became a sleepover staple, and its audience grew into a devoted fandom for whom Bowie's "Magic Dance" and "As the World Falls Down" are among his best-loved soundtrack songs. Tokyopop published a manga sequel, *Return to Labyrinth*, from 2006 to 2010, and in January 2016 Sony Pictures announced a new project with the screenwriter Nicole Perlman, who stressed that it would be neither a remake nor a reboot. Alongside *The Dark Crystal*, the 1984 film of [The Neverending Story](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/the-neverending-story/), and Lucas's own [Willow](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/willow-film/) two years later, *Labyrinth* belongs to the mid-1980s cycle of handcrafted fantasy films that bridged the puppet-and-matte-painting era and the digital age its CGI owl foretold. ## Facts - Henson's last feature as director, it followed his 1982 collaboration with Brian Froud, The Dark Crystal. - Monty Python's Terry Jones received sole screenplay credit, though George Lucas, Elaine May and Laura Phillips all worked on the script uncredited. - Its opening-credits barn owl is cited as the first realistic computer-generated animal in a feature film. - The baby Toby is played by Toby Froud, son of the film's conceptual designer, Brian Froud. - It earned about $12.9 million in the U.S. against a $25 million budget, then found a devoted audience on home video. - It was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and a BAFTA for special visual effects. ## Sources and further reading - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labyrinth_(1986_film)) --- From The Lantern Hall (https://www.lanternhall.org/), a museum of fantasy literature and roleplaying games.