The Magic Toyshop

A beautiful film about the wonderment and mysteries of childhood and the developing young girl in a mystical backdrop of the sinister toymakers house and family. Many contraversial topics are touched upon without any hint of moral lecturing or the political correctness of later years that we have grown to hate.Very worth seeing and worth the BBC reshowing if they have the courage for it.I would love to get hold of a PAL video copy.

Like "blackriverfalls" in Leeds, England, I, too, have been in search of a copy of The Magic Toyshop for the past 15 years. The movie, back in 1987, had a run in a tiny, now-defunct art-house cinema just off the University of California campus in Berkeley. I remember the movie receiving glowing reviews in the local free alternative presses.

The Magic Toyshop has left an indelible impression in my brain. Yes, the story is bizarre, disturbing, perverse, and sexually discomfiting; but that is the nature of Angela Carter's artistry. Her's is a world in which mythology, fairy tale, and childhood innocence meld and clash with the sometimes magical, sometimes perversely ugly reality of adult consciousness. The Magic Toyshop encapsulates the violence inherent in the confrontation of the adults' and children's worlds into a succinct cinematic package. Scene upon surrealistic scene vividly and lushly convey the romantic dreaminess of childhood and the tight rigidity of contrived adulthood.

A few years after its brief visit to the Bay Area, The Magic Toyshop was in rotation on the Bravo arts cable channel. I managed to make a VHS recording of The Magic Toyshop. The quality is poor, but luckily this was recorded before Bravo had to fall to running commercials, so my copy of the movie has no breaks. I hope I still have my VHS copy, because it seems that, despite the death of Angela Carter and the continued interest in her literary work, the movie The Magic Toyshop may exist as ephemerally as the memory of a persons's first cherished toy.

Other users here at IMDb seem to have a hard time locating this film, leading to talk of it having been suppressed. The reason The Magic Toyshop has become (unfairly) obscure is simply because it was screened on British television before having any major theatrical release. Technically it's a TV movie, made by the Granada network (not the BBC), and it has suffered the same fate as many British television movies of the 70's and 80's. Thankfully this film was released by Palace video in the UK - I located a copy and have now archived mine to DVD.

Caroline Milmoe was not underage when the film was made - she was 23 years old, playing a 15 year old. It is true that the nude scenes present a minor through a grown woman, and that is one of the central themes of the film - the sexual element itself is disturbingly grim.

The whole film has a unworldly sheen and inhabits magical realism long before it became fashionably known as such. Watch the camera track the parrot's gaze to get an idea of the sheer level of invention and ingenuity. And Milmoe really knows how to torment those braids...

This is one of the best films of the 1980's, and certainly the best film I have ever seen about childhood's end. I don't mind it being obscure because that lends it cult status, but I feel unhappy for the cast, particularly Caroline Milmoe, as this film is the top of their art and that deserves a wider audience.

Brilliant.

I saw this film on the A&E Channel in 1991 and have bitterly regretted not taping it then. The late Angela Carter herself wrote the screenplay and included elements of magical realism not present in her novel, which made it even more intriguing and absorbing. The cast includes the great Tom Bell as Uncle Philip and the terrific Irish actors Kilian McKenna and Lorcan Cranitch (of "Cracker" fame) as Finn and Francie. It is a fantastic adaptation of a difficult, strange and wonderful book, and I wish SOMEONE at Granada or the BBC or wherever would release it on all regions DVD already!

The best thing about this movie is the soundtrack.. It is just epic.

The movie itself has a great setting and great feeling as well. It is difficult to categorize and I would say it is a fantasy; yet it is not a very comfortable movie and has nudity and adult situations. At times the cruelty and sad situations almost make it a horror film. At the same time it doesn't necessarily feel like a horror film either.

The protagonist is a young girl around 16 who, because of the death of her parents, goes to her uncles home with her siblings. Her uncle is a toy-maker and a cruel man. The movie has some strange relationships and abuses going on. We notice all of this is happening while we are showered with fantastic, dreamy images and scenes including puppet shows, dances, animal costumes in gardens etc.

Caroline Milmoe who plays the main character is very lovely and does a great job. The different dresses she wears are kind of reminiscent of ballerina/ wedding dresses and add to the feel.

I very much recommend getting your hands on this movie if you are a fan of fantasy films or even horror movies like Argento's Suspiria or The Shining.