Disney's Darkest Film?

Something Wicked This Way Comes would be number 1, with Watcher in the Woods being 2, Black Hole would be 3 because it delves with a lot of elements that teens would grasp better than kids, Return to Oz would be 4 because it presents a more evil & sinister side to Oz than the '39 version, & Night Crossing would be 5 because it's about East Germans fleeing via hot air balloon to West Germany at night.

I'd add "Darby O'Gill and the Little People" to the list, simply for the banshee. When I was 8 or 9, there was a theatrical re-release. When that banshee hit the screen, there was nothing but a theater of screaming children who wanted to go home. All these years later, that's the only part of the movie I still remember.

Hunh, nobody's mentioned "Child of Glass," based on the popular novel "The Ghost Belongs to Me." It was made for TV, but every bit as traumatic to children of the era as "Watcher" was. Disney had a lot of wonderful, dark films in the period between Walt's death and Michael Eisner's reign.

Nobody's mentioned "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea". Seriously. Rightious yet pitifully deluded Captain Nemo (played to enigmatic perfection by a brooding, moody James Mason) and his blindly loyal crew. Fantasy it may be but it's surprisingly political (Disney didn't shy away) and arguably even more relevant in the 21st century. How dark is that? Take away Kirk Douglas's silly Ned Land (and I like Kirk Douglas) and it would have been positively octopuss inky black.

"Oh look - a lovely spider! And it's eating a butterfly!"
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