![]() ![]() ![]() He felt if he could have control over what was seen on-screen, he could've made the original ending work - and I'm personally inclined to agree. Hough felt that the released version of the original ending featured far too much footage of the titular Watcher (which was a cheesy puppet shot in post-production). ![]() This was a disappointment to not only fans, but also the director and the stars (Carol Baker, in particular, expressed an interest in seeing a director's cut, since most of her big scenes were trimmed). Instead, Disney only allowed two rough cuts of an alternate ending to be released - neither of which were quite the same as those that had been screened before. Although director John Hough offered to fly to the USA and assemble a director's cut on his own dime, his offer was declined. " The house of mouse retaliated by limiting Anchor Bay's rights to their archives, virtually nullifying all extras, and limiting their access to bonus materials (which could only be released without bearing the Disney name, causing some oddball editing in the trailers/TV spots). " Unfortunately, Anchor Bay embarrassed Disney by releasing a lavish edition of " The Happiest Millionaire. Anchor Bay Entertainment acquired the re-release rights for several Disney classics, including " Watcher. In the late '90s, there were plans to release an extended director's cut of the film. Weirdly, one of the scenes from the original ending appeared on the "Walt Disney and You" promo that appeared on the end of early Walt Disney home video releases. The film was re-released in 1981 with this new ending, but by this time the film's buzz had died off and it did only modest business at the box office. #Watcher in the woods proCasting of the leading girl came down to just a few young ladies (including Diane Lane), and the role was ultimately given to pro ice skater Lynn-Holly Johnson, who'd made a splash in 1978's Ice Castles (she should've stuck to ice skating), with supporting adult roles going to such old pros as Bette Davis, '50s/'60s sexpot Carol Baker and David McCallum ( The Man from U.N.C.L.E. Jan Carstairs and her family rent a manor in the idyllic British countryside for the summer. The film deviated from the source novel quite a bit, and the finale of the book is pretty unfilmable - it veers into a weird, sci-fi sequence featuring astral projection (for lack of a better term) - so the screenplay for the film went through numerous rewrites to hone in on an appropriate, filmable ending, and principal photography began with only a rough outline of what the film's final scene would be. Unfortunately, problems abounded right from the start. #Watcher in the woods tvSyn: The Scarecrow of Romny Marsh" debuted on TV over a decade earlier). #Watcher in the woods movieBased on the novel by Florence Engel Randall and directed by John Hough (who'd directed the original pair of Witch Mountain films), Watcher was meant to be the Disney's first big-screen horror film (though the similarly creepy Child of Glass debuted as a TV movie of the week in 1978, and "Dr. ![]()
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