| The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter |
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US theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | George T. Miller |
| Produced by | Dieter Geissler |
| Screenplay by | Karin Howard |
| Based on | The Neverending Story by Michael Ende |
| Starring | Jonathan Brandis Kenny Morrison Clarissa Burt John Wesley Shipp Alexandra Johnes Thomas Hill Faye Adell |
| Music by | Robert Folk Theme Song: Giorgio Moroder |
| Cinematography | David Connell |
| Editing by | Chris Blunden Peter Hollywood |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | October 25, 1990 (Germany) February 8, 1991 (United States) |
| Running time | 90 minutes |
| Country | United States Germany |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $17,373,527 (USA) |
The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter is a 1990 fantasy film and sequel to The NeverEnding Story. It was directed by George T. Miller and starred Jonathan Brandis as Bastian Bux, Kenny Morrison as Atreyu, and Alexandra Johnes as the Childlike Empress. The only actor to return from the first film was Thomas Hill as Mr. Koreander.
This film used plot elements from Michael Ende's novel The NeverEnding Story, but introduced a new storyline.
Upon its American theatrical release in 1991, the Bugs Bunny animated short "Box-Office Bunny" was shown before the movie. This short was also included on the VHS and Laserdisc release later that year.
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Bastian Bux is having troubles at home: his father, Barney, cannot relate to him—his busy workload is keeping him from spending time with his son and Bastian's fear of heights is hurting him on the swim team. Bastian flees from his problems to an old bookstore, when after picking up the NeverEnding Story book, he hears the Childlike Empress tell him that he is needed to save Fantasia.
Upon landing in Fantasia, he reunites with Atreyu and meets a new character, an anthropomorphic talking bird named Nimbly. Characters from the previous film, such as Falkor and Rock Biter, have minor roles in this film. Bastian now faces "the Emptiness", and he is soon manipulated by the evil sorceress Xayide and her magical army of mechanical giants. The sorceress has a sinister plan for Fantasia and the Childlike Empress, but much of the film involves her persuading Bastian to forget about his mission and instead make a series of silly wishes. Each wish that Bastian makes causes him to lose a memory, and when he loses all memories he will not remember Fantasia and the Emptiness will take over.
Meanwhile, Barney is out looking for his son, finding little help from the police or the bookstore owner, Mr. Koreander. He finds the NeverEnding Story book and is surprised to see his son's exploits unfolded on the page. As he follows Bastian's journey through the book, Atreyu conveys his concerns to Falkor and realizes he must stop Bastian before Xayide's hold over him becomes too strong to break. This leads to a fight between the two boys ending with Bastian accidentally sending Atreyu over the side of a small cliff.
As Atreyu's lifeless body lies at the bottom of the cliff, Bastian is momentarily shaken by the events, but then shouts to Atreyu that he brought his death on himself. He returns to Xayide, only to find the machine that has been collecting the orbs containing his memories and finally realizing the sorceress' evil intentions. Bastian then sees Falkor flying away with Atreyu's body. He eventually catches up to them and after expressing regret for inadvertently killing his friend, he sacrifices his memory of his beloved mother to wish Atreyu back to life.
Now Bastian has only one wish (and only one memory - his father) left. Xayide appears and urges him to use his final wish to return home, but instead he turns the tables on Xayide by wishing for her to have a heart. The overwhelming sense of suddenly being able to feel emotion proves to be too much for Xayide and the evil sorceress explodes in a blast of light, and with her destruction, Fantasia is restored in all its glory. After being thanked by the Childlike Empress and with the verbal encouragement of his father, Atreyu and Falkor, Bastian is able to face his fear of heights by jumping off a high cliff, thus returning home safely.
The sequel received mostly negative reviews from critics and currently holds a 4.4 out of 10 on Internet Movie Database (IMDb). It has a 0% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Richard Harrington's review for the Washington Post was typical of the largely negative reaction to the film, "Unlike its predecessor, there are few effects in "II" worthy of being called special, and events unfold with uniform flatness. Silver City feels like Diet Oz, the sorceress's castle is more hinted at than realized and several new creatures are right out of late-night comedy sketches".[1]
Chris Hicks, writing for the Deseret Morning News, was more kind in his review, noting that it would be enjoyable to children, whereas the first film was enjoyable to the entire family.[2]
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