Another help me remember this movie question

March 31, 2016 7:02 PM

It was the early 80s and I remember watching a fascinating kids adventure movie. But then I got scared from one scene and turned it off. I've never been able to find the movie since or learn how it ended. The scene I remember is of one character running up the stairs of the magical castle/dungeon to escape something terrible and the stairs disappearing as he tried to outrun them. Other things I remember:

- It was an Arabian Nights type story with multiple sons/princes who were tasked with bringing special gifts back (perhaps to the father/ruler or to a princess). The sons were killed one by one, but I think the main character was the youngest.
- I'm pretty sure his siblings perished before this scene. I'm pretty sure the character running up the stairs failed to make it out which is when I got scared.
- I think it may have been done in the style of the Little Drummer Boy and Frosty the Snowman, but it's very possible it was a cartoon instead.
- The stairs dissolved into sand. I seem to remember the colour scheme or even animated texture reminded me of sand.
- It can't be more recent than 1986, because I watched it on TV in Canada before moving to another continent that year. It wasn't a VHS but on TV, though it could have absolutely been older. The only channels we had were non-cable (so TVO, CBC, etc.)

I hope someone recognizes this!!!

posted by A hidden well to Media & Arts (3 answers total)

I am a stop-motion animation maniac and if this was Rankin-Bass (they did Little Drummer Boy and all those great old stop-motion TV holiday specials) I would at least be aware of it. I'm really into stop-motion in general, and this doesn't sound familiar to me. This leads me to think that if it was animated it was probably drawn, or it's live action. It's not much, but maybe that can help focus your search a bit.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:31 AM on April 1, 2016

I am wondering if it's one of the older stop-motion Sinbad films (there were three moVies from the 1950s to 1970s), and based on the date it could be Eye Of The Tiger (1977) or Golden Voyage in 1973

I can't remember the scene (and I am a big fan of these type of films), so I only mention it as it night be a starting point, and my memory can be terrible.

My other thought is that there might have been some sort Wonderful World of Disney 1000 Nights/Thief of Baghdad type of thing that, while it might seem hilarious to be scared of now, might well have been shocking at the time.
posted by Mezentian at 6:08 AM on April 1, 2016 [1 favorite]

This sort of sounds like the plot of the Twelve Dancing Princesses? Muddled through a child's memory? I think at one point eleven (or maybe all twelve) of the sisters get "bewitched" and maybe get trapped underground... And there's a secret staircase back up to the real world that maybe someone could race up. The protagonist of the Twelve Dancing Princesses is actually a young boy/man sent to discover the princesses' secret. All the men who'd gone before him got killed trying.
posted by thebazilist at 12:15 PM on April 1, 2016