Another search for a lost childhood movie
January 23, 2012 6:18 PM   Subscribe

I am trying to find a movie that I saw as a child.

This movie:
1. Was animated
2. Was really scary but I don't really remember what it was about
3. I seem to recall that it had some bloody, frothy animal characters, perhaps in a cave
4. There may have been a unicorn
5. Was not Watership Down, Unico, the Last Unicorn, or the Secret of nimh
6. There may have been some vaguely end of the world element similar to the never ending story or something like that with an abyss.
7. This movie probably came out in the 1980s. I'm reasonably sure it was an American movie.

This movie has been haunting me for decades -- does anyone know what this movie was? Did I dream it?
posted by birdbone to Society & Culture (16 answers total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 
The Last Unicorn, 1982

Wizards 1977
posted by the man of twists and turns at 6:22 PM on January 23, 2012


The Black Caldron
posted by myselfasme at 6:28 PM on January 23, 2012


two easily confused possibilities -
Black Cauldron
Dark Crystal
posted by LobsterMitten at 6:34 PM on January 23, 2012


Fire and Ice
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 6:49 PM on January 23, 2012


You can always online search for animated films that came out during the period your thinking of. Might get you closer?
posted by Under the Sea at 7:00 PM on January 23, 2012


Possibly The Plague Dogs?

Scared the hell out of me as a child, for sure. Very dark film. It was done by the same folks who created the Watership Down film (and the book was written by the same author).
posted by Squee at 7:16 PM on January 23, 2012


Not animated, but maybe The Neverending Story?
posted by triggerfinger at 7:23 PM on January 23, 2012


I'll throw out the random non-American movie I just happened to watch last night:
The Sea Prince and the Fire Child.

There's an abyss like vortex of spinning bloody-red water. There's a little fish boy with a unicorn horn. There's a number of times that the movie could be rather intense for a kid (and frankly, some of the emotional elements that are only sad are rather fucked up, compared to other kid movies).

This was released in 1981 in Japan and in 1982 in the U.S.
posted by DisreputableDog at 7:36 PM on January 23, 2012


I was coming to suggest Sea Prince as well, only because you mentioned Unico, and past experience has shown me that a lot of people get the two mixed up.
posted by Stacey at 7:41 PM on January 23, 2012


The Hobbit?
posted by This_Will_Be_Good at 9:37 PM on January 23, 2012


Whoops, forgot a link to a clip -- I watched this so many times as a youngin', and there were a lot of parts that were pretty scary to little kids.
posted by This_Will_Be_Good at 9:41 PM on January 23, 2012


For the blood factor I'm thinking that it may have been "Wizards" too...
posted by Hanuman1960 at 5:46 AM on January 24, 2012


Best answer: If you don't get an answer here, try asking over at Kindertrauma.
posted by JanetLand at 6:01 AM on January 24, 2012 [1 favorite]


Could it have been the animated Lord of the Rings? The wringwraiths in that version I remember giving me some serious willies as a kid. No unicorns, but undead horses and it came out in '78.
posted by BevosAngryGhost at 8:22 AM on January 24, 2012


Response by poster: Based on the clips I've watched from these, I don't really think any of them are the answer, but I'll try to track down the whole movies and try them out. At least I have some new interesting things to watch, I'll let you know if any of them turn out to be right.
posted by birdbone at 5:11 PM on January 24, 2012


Response by poster: Kindertrauma sounds like a good bet though!
posted by birdbone at 5:12 PM on January 24, 2012


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