Return from Witch Mountain

Return from Witch Mountain is the 1978 sequel to Disney's 1975 film Escape to Witch Mountain. It was written by Malcolm Marmorstein and is based on the novel by Alexander Key. Ike Eisenmann, Kim Richards, and Denver Pyle reprise their roles as Tony, Tia, and Uncle Bené—humanoid extraterrestrials with special powers including telepathy and telekinesis. The two main villains are played by Bette Davis as Letha Wedge, a greedy woman using the last of her money to finance the scientific experiments of Dr. Victor Gannon, played by Christopher Lee.
A made-for-television sequel called Beyond Witch Mountain was made in 1982.
==Plot==
Tony and his sister, Tia are in need of a vacation. Uncle Bené drops them off in their flying saucer at the Rose Bowl stadium in Los Angeles, California, after which the siblings quickly become separated from each other. A man named Dr. Victor Gannon (Lee) and his assistant, Letha Wedge (Davis) happen to see Tony using his powers to save Letha's nephew, Sickle from certain death. Realizing that Tony has supernatural powers, Dr. Gannon drugs the boy with a tranquilizer shot and takes him back to their laboratory. There, Dr. Gannon successfully tests a new mind-control technology on him. Under its influence, Tony is completely hypnotized and does everything that his kidnappers want him to do, including stealing gold from a museum exhibit and stopping Tia from finding them. With Tony at his robotic bidding, Dr. Gannon hopes to achieve recognition within the scientific community and worldwide power, while Letha merely wants a return on her investment.
A group of would-be tough boys whom she comes across, called the Earthquake Gang are chased by the goons; Tia telepathically gets rid of them. The gang of boys accept her into their gang and help look for her brother. They let her sleep in their secret hideout. She often gets many visions of where her brother is. First at the gold museum where Tony is controlled by a chip attached to his ear. He unstacks the gold but is chased by Mr. Yokomoto the truant officer, who thinks Tony has to go to school and chases the doctor, aunt, nephew, and Tony in his mini bus. Unsuccessfully Mr. Yokomoto destroyed public property and ends up losing his job. Next, Tia uses her telepathy to trace Tony's hideout, but is caught by Sickle and is under the influence of chloroform. She telepathically asks Alfred the goat, who is in the house to find the Earthquake Gang. They chase the goat back to the hideout.
In the meantime, Tony, Letha, Sickle, and Victor drive to a plutonium plant as it is more expensive than gold. Tia traces their location and describes it to be a "big round ball." One of the members assumes the location to be another place and Tia is upset. They come across Mr. Yokomoto, who tells them he lost his job and the only thing that works is the radio. The news given about the plutonium plant stresses on the word "molecular flow."
Tia then asks Mr. Yokomoto to drive them to the location after she magically repairs the minibus. After Victor and gang reach the site, he shuts down the plant's cooling system. In exchange to turn it on he requires five million dollars in cash. The people working at the plant make arrangements for money as soon as possible. Tia reaches in time where she and Tony battle to turn on the cooling system. Tia manages to turn it on but Victor commands Tony to kill his sister. In this course of time, she understands how he is been controlled and destroys the device. Tia explains what had happened to him. In retaliation, he causes Victor, Sickle, and Letha to rise onto the ceiling with no way of getting down. Mr. Yokomoto drives the kids to the Rose Bowl Stadium and the Earthquake Gang come along to say bye. Tony and Tia bid farewell to the kids after they board the flying saucer back to Witch Mountain.
==Cast==
*Bette Davis as Letha Wedge
*Christopher Lee as Dr. Victor Gannon
*Kim Richards as Tia Malone
*Ike Eisenmann as Tony Malone
*Jack Soo as Mr. "Yo-Yo" Yokomoto
*Anthony James as Sickle
*Richard Bakalyan as Eddie
*Ward Costello as Mr. Clearcole
*Christian Juttner as Dazzler
*Brad Savage as Muscles
*Poindexter Yothers as Crusher
*Jeffrey Jacquet as Rocky
*Stu Gillman as Dolan
*William Bassett as Operations officer
*Tom Scott as Monitor
*Helene Winston as Dowager
*Albert Able as Engineer
*Denver Pyle as Uncle Bene
*Brian Part, Pierre Daniel as Goons
*Wally Brooks as Taxi fare
*Mel Gold as Security guard
*Bob Yothers as Cop
*Casse Jaeger as School patrolman
*Larry Mamorstein as Guard
*Bob James as Gate guard
*Ruth Warshawsky as Lady in car
*Adam Anderson as Man in museum
*Rosemary Lord as Woman in museum
*Ted Noose as Policeman
*Wally Berns as Man in car
==Filming locations==
The otherwise vacant lot, upon which the children's dilapidated hideout mansion stands, is today the location for One California Plaza, a high-rise office complex, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles museum center in Downtown Los Angeles, as well as at the restored Angels Flight funicular. The gold-bar robbery sequence was filmed at the Natural History Museum in Exposition Park, Los Angeles. The building facing the Park's Rose Garden was used for exterior shots of the museum. The scene in which Yokomoto's van is overturned, and breaks a fire-hydrant, was filmed near the Sunset Blvd. bridge and Glendale Blvd. underpass intersection, in the Echo Park district.
==Trivia==
*Actors Kim Richards and Ike Eisenmann appear in at least four films together — this one, the original 1975 Disney film Escape to Witch Mountain and the television film Devil Dog: The Hound of Hell. Richards portrays the roadside waitress and Eisenmann portrays the Sheriff in a re-imagined remake of the original film Race to Witch Mountain released in March 2009.
*Jack Soo (Mr. "Yoyo" Yokomoto) was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the Autumn of 1978, several months after the film's release. Return from Witch Mountain would be his final movie appearance, as he died the following January.
*The emergency voice heard over Yokomoto's van radio — announcing the problem at the plutonium plant — is that of Gary Owens.
==Gallery==
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Category:Disney films
Category:Live-action films
Category:Sequel films
Category:1978 films
Category:G-rated films
Category:Witch Mountain