Legend Review (1985) – A cringe-worthy glitter fest that will leave you bored, bemused, and wondering…why?

This month is one of our all-time favorite months of the year, wonderful September! This month contains our favorite holiday that we here celebrate as well as the beginning of our favorite time of year: Fall! Yes it may be basic…but it really is the best time of year!

We have deemed this month to be live-action fantasy month and to kick this month off we are starting with an older film that we had some nostalgic attachment to and a deep appreciation for Tim Curry’s performance. The 1985 fantasy, “Legend.”

There are not many trigger warnings to give for this film…as it is incredibly ridiculous but! There is some minor violence, death, and scary looking bad guys that have the potential to be nightmare fuel. The practical effects in this film are truly phenomenal and honestly was the best part of the film next to Tim Curry of course!

Get ready for a journey into a world of questionable fashion choices, glitter everywhere, confusing plot twists, and female characters who seem to have misplaced their agency somewhere in the enchanted forest!

We will do everything we can to not give too many spoilers in this review but there are likely to be some, so please take that into consideration and read cautiously. Let’s get started!

The movie starts with a black screen and red writing literally describing the entire plot of the film…this was a very poor choice in our opinion. That is way too much exposition, and while some exposition may not be a bad thing…telling us the entire story that we are about to watch…kind of is.

It pretty much tells us…everything except how the movie ends but this movie is about as deep as a puddle so you can easily figure out how the movie ends. Again, not the best choice here and we are not going to discuss it further as it really is too revealing! Moving on!

When we get through the exposition, we fade to a forest at night and a goblin-like creature lurking around in the woods. The goblin appears to be returning to his place of origin…what that is, is a bit confusing. All we see is a giant, tree like structure that looks like it has an opening in the front of it.

Direct cut to a medieval torture chamber and two large men with helmets on torturing some poor random guy in the background. The whole room is practically covered in fire…which concerned us a bit. It looks like a safety hazard. The room is filled with smoke, and looks like it is literally boiling hot…we feel for the actors in this scene…moving forward!

We cut to a large black glittering throne with a huge, black, horned demon-like figure seated within its depths, Darkness, (Tim Curry). Darkness’s nails are glowing a bright green as are his eyes. He starts to speak…begging, “Mother night, fold your dark arms about me. Protect me in your black embrace.”

The writing in this movie leaves A LOT to be desired. It is extremely corny, and cheesy. But! We still adore Tim Curry’s performance! He is amazing and the practical effects to make him look like a giant horned demon is incredible!

As Darkness laments, the goblin that we started the film with enters the room. Darkness is pleased to see Blix, (Alice Playten) and they have a truly hilarious and cheesy exchange about the blackness of Blix’s evil heart.

Blix looks incredibly realistic and extremely creepy! Darkness tells Blix that he is troubled and tormented by…unicorns. Yes…unicorns. In this world, unicorns are the greatest source of good, light, and purity.

Is it beyond silly? Yes. How are unicorns more powerful than the actual sun? We do not know…but we could just…not fully understand the lore of unicorns. Honestly, unicorns are not mythical creatures that we potatoes ever had much interest in. If you love unicorns we love this for you and support you! Back to the film!

Darkness tells Blix that he needs him to go find the unicorns, and bring the horns of each unicorn to him. Blix is eager to please him, and asks him how to catch them. Darkness tells him that there is only one way to catch a unicorn…innocence.

We fade away from Darkness and Blix, and into a beautiful forest with a young woman in a medieval, but aristocratic looking gown running through the woods. She reaches a cottage and plays some small tricks on the people who live there.

They know her and Lili (Mia Sara) is always welcome in their cute cottage…but she is a “lady” and should not be visiting commoners? We think this is trivial, and fortunately so does Lili. She disagrees, but she has business in the woods and cannot stay long!

She runs back into the forest and starts yelling for our main male character, Jack (Tom Cruise). Jack leaps out of the trees crouching on a large branch and scaring Lili. Jack looks like he wanted to be Peter Pan, but he is bit too old to pull off the look…so he just looks awkward.

Jack and Lili run through the forest together…in an incredibly cringe filled montage with some awkward kissing. Jack seems to have this perpetual dumbfounded look on his face throughout the whole film. It is really funny and was a really funny sip for the drinking game. But we digress!

After the uncomfortable montage, Jack pulls out a blind fold. He wants to blind fold Lili so he can show her something sacred. If you haven’t already figured it out…well it is, of course, the unicorns…a little something we left out…Blix and his cronies have been watching Lili this whole time! Waiting for their opportunity. How they knew she would lead them to the unicorns is beyond us…but they are there lying in wait.

The unicorns show up! The horses are truly gorgeous and the horns that they put on them do look real. The unicorns have a little playful montage themselves with corny music in the background. Jack says, “As long as they roam the earth, evil can never harm a pure heart.”

We potatoes are a bit confused by this…why? Why unicorns? Yes they are magical creatures…but how do they prevent harm just by existing? We do not know and it is not really explained in the film.

Blix is watching the unicorns frolic and preparing for the right moment to strike. Then Jack gives us some more gems after Lili asks how to communicate with them…he says, “They express only love and laughter. Dark thoughts are unknown to them.”

Oh goodness…the writing you guys…it is truly one of the corniest films we’ve seen in a while and we watched this film when we were kids.

Lili is, of course, not satisfied with just watching the unicorns from afar! She has to get closer and she has to touch one! Jack warns her against it but she ignores him. She must touch the unicorn!

This is an annoying scene for a multitude of reasons. One, the blatantly sexist portrayal of a young woman her age behaving in such a childish manner…made us roll out eyes to say the least. Also, it is fairly common knowledge that it is unwise to touch, or mess with wild animals in general! No matter how cute, mystical, magical, or pretty they may be! You do not touch them. Do not feed them. ETC! Gaze upon them, sure! But mess with them? NO.

Lili must not have gotten that basic memo…Jack tries to tell her, but of course, the writers insisted that Lili be childlike, and dumb.

Lili is a classic case of "damsel in distress." She has a strong old school Disney princess vibe to her. Snow White in particular comes to mind. She spends half the movie looking wistfully at butterflies and the other half making life choices that boggle the mind…like touching sacred wild animals! But we digress!

She succeeds in getting close to a unicorn and touching it. Blix uses Lili as a distraction in order to shoot the unicorn with a poisoned dart! The unicorn, of course, freaks out, and both of the unicorns run off. Lili does not understand what she has done wrong…she seems to understand very little in general…so this is no surprise. Jack looks stunned.

Both of the unicorns run until the injured one lays down! (No horses were injured in this film. They are trained). Blix and his cronies follow the unicorns and manage to remove the horn of the injured one causing it to pass away. The weather has suddenly taken a dark turn! Instead of it being a beautiful summer day…the sky darkens and it starts pouring snow!

Did you know that unicorns controlled the weather?! We didn’t, and it is yet another thing not explained in the film. It just happens and it is somehow tied to one of the unicorns passing.

Another thought we had while watching this film, is just how outdated a lot of these ideas are, even for the time that film came out. The concept that winter is somehow evil or worse in comparison to summer or spring is a bit antiquated. We know now that for areas of the world that experience winter, (the four seasons are not always accurate! It very much depends on where you live), that winter serves a purpose and makes sense.

We know that while winter may not be everyone’s favorite season…it has nothing to do with good or evil. It is just a natural cycle that a lot of us experience every year. Sigh. This movie has no subtlety. It hits you over the head with black and white thinking and does not offer nuance, complexity or genuine thought.

Moving on!

Lili is clueless. Jack is clueless. Apparently no one in this world fully understands what is going on either! Then, as if trying to divert attention from the fact that she just “startled” a unicorn by touching it, Lili throws a ring she is wearing into a pond and tells Jack that she will marry whoever retrieves this ring.

Immediately distracted from his anger at her for not listening to him about touching the unicorns, Jack dives after it and while he is under the water the entire world ices over. He bursts through the ice dramatically with the ring and starts shouting for Lili!

Lili for some reason…has run off and ditched him! She is literally and dramatically, floundering around the forest. She miraculously manages to make it to the cottage of her friend only to find that her friend is completely frozen solid!

She hears Blix and his buddies approaching, so Lili hides in a loft above. Blix bursts into the cottage, swirling around the unicorn horn. The horn has magical properties…almost like a wand? Blix is having some fun with it as he and his buddies brag about killing the unicorn and talk about how great this new world is!

Lili is overhearing this and it seems to finally dawn on her that she played a part in the current state of the world. From here, we cut back to Jack, wandering the woods and looking for Lili. He passes out, but he wakes up to a roaring fire next to him and an elf? An elf named Gump (David Bennent)…yes his name is truly Gump.

Gump looks like a kind of Peter Pan wannabe too! Jack is surprised and cautious. Gump introduces himself and his two companions, Brown Tom (Cork Hubbert) and Screwball (Billy Barty).

Yes you are reading this correctly, Brown Tom and Screwball appear to be some kind of play on dwarves. Honestly they are both rather insulting to dwarves…Gimli would not stand for it, but moving on!

We have to admit that we could not stop laughing at Brown Tom…the name makes it sound like he has soiled himself. It also reminded us strongly of Dead Tom in Muppet Treasure Island and this also made us giggle! What is even more amusing about it is that the antics of Screwball and Brown Tom are supposed to be the comic relief in the film…but their names are the funniest part about them!

We are going to start wrapping it up here so as to not give too much more away…but honestly it doesn’t matter! The rest of the film is straightforward. Jack and his new found friends decide to go on a quest to defeat Darkness! Darkness is plotting to find and kill the last unicorn which is not difficult at all because the last unicorn keeps hanging around the body of their mate. Once Darkness has the last unicorn, he also manages to capture Lili along with it! Darkness then becomes obsessed with her…and tries to corrupt her…what will happen next?! Will Light defeat Darkness?! Will Jack manage to save Lili?! Will they ever grow up and realize that the world is not black and white?! We won’t tell!

As we are sure you can tell, this movie frustrated us. However, we loved the practical effects, and the monsters looked amazing. Tim Curry is wonderful even with the poor writing and he is the only reason we would ever rewatch this film again!

The rest of the film did not do the great Tim Curry justice. All of the characters are written poorly. They are vapid, boring and shallow. Everything is covered in glitter including the actors! It's like the costume and set designers went on a glitter-shopping spree and decided that no surface—be it clothing, props, or even the air—should go untouched! Everything must glitter! The whole film is so predictable that it is somewhat boring and the writing is so corny that it is difficult to take the film seriously.

Now, let's dive into the portrayal of the female characters. There are not many women in the film but oh my, is it a cringe fest. Lili, bless her sparkly heart, has all the depth of a kiddie pool!

Lili's portrayal embodies classic damsel-in-distress vibes, reduced to an emotional child whose decisions are poor and her survival hinges on the presence of the male character, Jack. This typecasting leaves so much to be desired and doesn't do justice to women in any way. It reinforces harmful ideas that women are childlike, overly emotional, impulsive, thoughtless and that their worth is tied to whether or not they have a man in their life!

We understand that this movie was made in a different time…but we feel that this is still a poor excuse, especially considering that the first Alien film, which Ridley Scott also directed, came out BEFORE this film did! Today, we look for and appreciate authentic and empowering portrayals of women in our media, "Legend" falls outrageously short of that!

Another issue we had with the film is just how ridiculous and overly simplistic the plot of the film is! Light: good. Dark: bad….did a cave man write this? Firstly life is not that simple, and it is not supposed to be. Secondly this kind of thinking can be problematic and detrimental!

Unfortunately black and white thinking is a problem that is far more common than it should be. Black-and-white thinking, similar to the film's blatant contrast, can be comforting in its simplicity. It causes us to put on blinders that prevent us from seeing the complexity and nuance that come with navigating life and its varied shades of gray.

When we reinforce black-and-white thinking, we're often left unable to tolerate ambiguity or uncertainty. It can cause us to think in only extremes, viewing situations and even other people as purely good or bad which doesn't leave room for growth, empathy, or understanding.

It has vastly concerning effects on our mental health as well! This stark approach can lead to anxiety, depression, and even intolerance. It causes us to miss out on the vibrant colors of life which help lead us to compassion, forgiveness, and personal growth!

Black and white thinking is all around us, and is even reinforced in silly, yet boring films like Legend. We want to encourage everyone to embrace nuance, recognize the complexities, and allow yourself to look past stark contrasts. It’s in the gray areas where we will find the most profound growth, understanding, and healing!

As we have already made fairly clear, we do not love this film! We appreciate small parts of it, and we always love to see Tim Curry. But other than that…we found this film to be a boring, outrageous, stereotyping, limiting, over-the-top, and glittery mess.

But! If you're in the mood for a glitter-soaked acid trip with questionable character portrayals and problematic messaging then this is the movie for you! We also want to say that this movie does get some nostalgia points and if you are someone who loves this film because it is a nostalgic film for you, we completely understand!

We give this movie 2 out 5 Darkness cocktails!

The Legend Drinking Game

Take a sip anytime:

1.     Darkness is on screen

2.     Darkness laughs

3.     Jack crouches

4.     Jack has a crotch shot

5.     There’s a shot of Jack with his mouth hanging open

6.     Lily does something mischievous/stupid or doesn't listen

7.     Blix rhymes

8.     Oona is annoying

9.     Anyone says Brown Tom

10.  Anyone says Screwball

11.  There's a unicorn on screen

12.  The movie makes you cringe

13.  There's a Dewey/glittery lighting effect

14.  You hear chimes or twinkling sounds

15.  There are bubbles on screen

16.  There's fire on screen

What did you think? Did you like the movie? Did you hate it? What movies should we watch? Any and all thoughts are welcome! Let us know here in the comments and always remember to be safe and drink responsibly!