Hocus Pocus (film)

A 1993 Halloween-themed Disney film for "kids". This was the second film directed by Kenny Ortega, previously known for Newsies (1993). Now considered a cult favorite, the film's rather campy, but pretty entertaining. It does, after all, contain a memorable rendition of "I Put A Spell On You" by Bette Midler. The song "Come Little Children" from this film went on to become a Halloween classic.

The film opens in the year 1693. Thackery Binx (role shared by Sean Murray and Jason Marsden), a teenager living in Salem, Massachusetts, discovers his little sister Emily (Amanda Shepherd) has gone missing. Emily has been lured away to the farm of the Sanderson sisters, a trio of witches--consisting of older sister/leader Winifred "Winnie" (Bette Midler), middle child/tracker Mary (Kathy Najimy) and little sister/siren-like predator Sarah (Sarah Jessica Parker)--who suck the life-forces of little children to prolong their lives; such is the fate suffered by Emily. Thackery attempts to save her, but the sisters transform him into an immortal black cat. The sisters are soon after captured by the townspeople and hanged; before her death, Winnie pronounces her death-curse, that "on All Hallow's Eve, when the moon is round, a virgin will summon us from under the ground."

The scene shifts to 1993. The Dennisons are a California family who has just moved to Salem, bringing along teenaged son Max (Omri Katz) and 8-year-old daughter Dani (Thora Birch). Max is a virgin. Halloween night, Max takes his sister trick-or-treating and gets to hang with new Love Interest Allison (Vinessa Shaw). Allison tells him of the legend of the Sanderson sisters and of a supposed way to revive them; Max laughs and tries it out, bringing the Sandersons back to life. Now the three kids and the immortal cat Binx have to face the witches throughout the night, with the lives of every kid in Salem at risk.

While a 1994 side-scrolling platformer by the same name also exists, they don't have any connection to each other. Also unrelated is Kurt Vonnegut's 1991 novel of the same name.

Tropes used in Hocus Pocus (film) include:

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Max, Dani and Allison have to flee the witches and zombie Billy Butcherson by following Thackery into the sewers, which are filled with spiders and rats, which is what Thackery eats as a cat! Very squicky to the trio.
• Adults Are Useless: The children tried to get help from their parents and the rest of the partygoers at the party.
  • They also tried for help from the man they thought was a police officer. (He was only in costume.)
  • To be fair to the adults, all the kids did say was "I accidentally woke up the Sanderson witches" on Halloween in a town where the Sanderson witches "coming back to life" is probably the most common prank every single Halloween.
  • Max and Dani's parents are useless long before anything supernatural happens. When Max comes home in his stocking feet after his shoes are stolen by bullies, they assume it's somehow a form of protest against them.
  • And at the party, when Billy (the zombie) pushes between the parents and chases the children:

Mom: (cheerfully) I wish we had the camera.

• All Hallow's Eve
• All Part of the Show: What the adult partygoers think of the Sandersons taking over the stage and singing a song to them, to the point they actually indulge in audience participation and sing too, thus unknowingly enchanting themselves. May well count as a Moment of Awesome, particularly for Winifred figuring out that the witches could do this.
• All There in the Script: The screenplay has some enlightening dialog that sheds a bit of light of certain things:
  • Winnie's spellbook belongs to (or once belonged) to Satan, and it is valued to the sisters because the information within it can change to be whatever they want whenever they want, making it the ultimate endless evil weapon of ever-changing spells.
  • Allison’s ancestor is a good witch named Elizabeth Podbury, which could explain her knowledge of witchcraft. The novelization expands on this: her full name was Elizabeth Sanderson Podbury, and she was the family's White Sheep.
  • If a witch touches salt, it burns her skin. This is why a circle of salt protects against their magic.
  • While the sisters look human, their bodies are essentially their souls being contained in a body made of candle wax.
  • If the witches consume enough children, they'll be immortal.
  • Thackery is not exactly "immortal". While Winnie taunts him that he will live forever, he actually has only nine million lives and will die when he uses them up. At one point, he says that he has used up 321 of them but there "are only so many ways to go".
  • The Sanderson Sisters are actually half-sisters born out of wedlock. According to Allison, Winnie’s father was a warlock, Mary’s was a bloodhound (hence her ability to smell children) and Sarah’s was the village idiot. This was retconned in the sequel.
  • The Dennisons moved to Salem simply because they wanted Max and Dani to grow up in a healthy environment.
• All Witches Have Cats: Inverted in Hocus Pocus. The witch sisters transform one of the protagonists, Binx, into a black cat For the Evulz. By the time of the main narrative, he's their sworn enemy. As mentioned in Animal Motifs below, Mary's more like a dog.
• Animal Motifs: The animal itself is never mentioned, but Mary's appears to be a dog, what with her tendency to bark, her power to smell children, and the way she's always at Winifred's side.
• Beauty, Brains, and Brawn: The three witches; Sarah is the beauty, Winifred is the brains, and Mary is the brawn.
• Berserk Button: Someone calls Winifred "ugly" and she instantly starts handing out the Disproportionate Retribution.
• Bigger Bad: The devil (see "Satan" below)
• Big Bad Truumvirate: The Sanderson sisters.
• Big Brother Instinct: Thackery Binx and Max are both deeply protective of their little sisters, and Binx projects a lot of his feelings about Emily onto Dani.
• Big, Thin, Short Trio: While none of the witches are especially tall (in fact, they're all under five-three) Winnie, Sarah and Mary fit in this order.
• Black Magic
• Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: The three witches; Sarah is blonde, Mary has dark hair, and Winnie is a redhead.
• Bratty Half-Pint: Dani, who keeps mocking her brother for being a virgin. It's possible she just doesn't know what it means, though, but she does still keep saying it to get a rise out of him.
• Burn the Witch: Averted. In a Disney film! The witches are hanged, just like the real "witches" of Salem.
  • Double Subverted. They end up getting cooked in a large walk-in kiln in the school.
    • Triple Subverted: it doesn't keep, because the Candle is still lit.
• Butt Monkey: Max, whose virginity is repeatedly invoked and commented on.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Winnie Sanderson at one point says to her sisters "We are witches, we are evil!"
• Cats Are Magic: Binx, a teenager who was transformed into a black cat by the Sandersons. He has the ability to speak, and he is effectively Immortality.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Sarah.
• Compelling Voice: Sarah's primary power - her song about halfway through the movie calls all the children in Salem to the Sanderson Sisters' home, and let's the viewers know that she isn't as harmless as she appears to be (up to this point, she played the part of The Ditz and was pretty much Winifred's punching bag).
• Convenient Slow Dance: Parodied: While the Sanderson Sisters are in "the Master's" house, Sarah goes to "the Master" and says, "Master, wouldst thou dance with me?" She then makes a tender slow dance with him... until his wife shows up and sees them both dancing, which triggers her Berserk Button.
• Credits Pushback: Because of this, the Disney Channel no longer airs The Stinger for the movie.
• Creepy Cemetery: It relies on elements from the rest of the movie to add the creepiness factor.
• Deadpan Snarker: Binx. Winnie has her moments, as well.
  • Little Miss Snarker: Dani.
• Died Happily Ever After: Thackery and Emily at the end. Thackery consoles a grieving Dani.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Thackery Binx was already going to have his life sucked out of him for trying to stop the witches from killing his sister, but he makes the mistake of calling Winifred a hag and is instead damned to a Fate Worse Than Death in the form of being trapped in the form of a black cat... for all eternity... living with his failure.
  • Also in case of Billy Butcherson, Winnie's lover. Winnie poisoned him and sewed his mouth shut after she caught him sporting with Sarah.
• Disney Death: Binx revives after being crushed by the bus.
• The Ditz: Sarah.
• Do Not Call Me Paul: One of the two bad boys, "Ice", hates being called "Ernie".
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Winnie apparently can't understand self-sacrifice, especially for a family member.
• Evil Is Hammy: Let's face it, the witches are about the biggest hams you've ever seen.
• Faux Affably Evil: Winnie is this when she's not busy to kill children or whatever.
• Fete Worse Than Death: The party at the town hall, at least after the witches take over the proceedings.
• Fiery Redhead: Winifred.
• Five-Man Band:
  • The Hero - Max
  • The Lancer - Dani
  • The Smart Guy / Team Pet - Binx
  • The Big Guy - Billy
  • The Chick - Allison
• Flying Broomstick: Used straight and then parodied when their brooms are stolen, forcing Sarah to fly on a mop and Mary on a vacuum cleaner.
• For Halloween I Am Going as Myself:
  • Max wears street clothes when he takes Dani trick-or-treating. His father thinks he's supposed to be a hip-hop deejay, while Dani insists he's a Little Leaguer.
    • Of course, it could just be a form of protest (For Halloween, I Am Not Going As Anything), since Max had no intention of taking Dani trick or treating at all until Dani started shrieking at the top of her lungs.
  • Allison dresses as an aristocratic lady for her parents' soiree, but quickly changes out of it and is in modern-day clothes for the rest of the movie.
  • The Sanderson sisters are dressed as stereotypical witches because, well that's what they are. Meaning they're attending Halloween as themselves, but just happen to fit in extremely well.
• From the Mouths of Babes: Dani regarding Max's nonexistent sex life.
  • Also, "You sold your soul!" to Winifred.
• Functional Magic
• Getting Crap Past the Radar: See above.

Winifred: We desire...children. Bus Driver: Hey, it may take me a couple of tries, but I don't think there will be a problem.

• Have a Gay Old Time: Invoked in setting up the A Man Is Not a Virgin Overly Long Gag.
• The Hecate Sisters
• Heel Face Turn: Billy (although he really wasn't a bad guy to begin with, aside from the obvious fact that he two-timed Winifred).
• Holy Burns Evil: When Winifred sneezes, a passing little girl (in costume as an Angel) says "Bless you!", prompting all three sisters to react with horror.
  • As per the spell that only resurrected them for one night, the Sanderson Sisters will be turned to dust when the sun rises. Witches can't set foot on hallowed ground either, and when Winifred tries to quickly kill Max in the graveyard before sunrise, she's turned into a stone statue for standing in a holy place. As if that weren't enough, when the sunlight hits the statue, it explodes.
• Hot Mom: Max and Dani's mom, at least when she's dressed up as Madonna.
• I Take Offense to That Last One:

Jay: Man, how come it's always the ugly chicks that stay out late?! Winifred: "Chicks?"

• • Contrast with Winifred's offense at Dani calling her "Ugly."
    • It's probable that Winifred is confused as to her and her sisters being referred to as "chicks." When they're from, chicks are baby chickens.
• Infant Immortality: Averted in a Disney movie! The Sanderson Sisters kill Emily.

The Nostalgia Chick: First plot point, death of a child.

• Intellectual Animal: Binx to some extent, but especially when compared to those around him...
• Ironic Echo: At one point, Winifred swoops in on the kids, taunting them with Max's earlier line "It's just a bunch of Hocus Pocus!" Fridge Logic kicks in when you realize Winifred wasn't Back From the Dead yet when Max said it, and couldn't have heard it.
  • Winifred references Gypsy and Elton John. She apparently had the ability to be aware of certain things while dead.
  • Indeed, for how this movie works, just because the character is dead doesn't mean they can't see/hear what's going on.
• Large Ham: Bette Midler. And it's surprisingly awesome.
• Life Energy: With the help of a potion, the witches could just take a few long whiffs and their victim will be dead.
• Light Is Not Good: Beautiful, sunny-haired, ditzy Sarah, singing sweetly to lure children to their deaths at the hands of the witches.
• Literal Metaphor: "I Put a Spell on You" as sung by Winnie.
• Magic Music: "Come Little Children" and "I Put a Spell on You" combine this with Compelling Voice, providing an excellent justification for a Villain Song.
• The Man Behind the Man: The devil is implied to be behind the Sandersons (see "Satan" below)
• A Man Is Not a Virgin: The audience is reminded every five minutes that Max is one. Rather jarring considering the target audience and that Max is young enough to still be commuting by bicycle. Seriously, Disney?
  • "What are you doing if you're in High School and still a virgin?"
  • Insinuating that Max is not a real man.
• My Name Is Not Durwood: In one scene Max introduces himself to the two bullies, Jay and "Ice", and says he's from L.A. Since they realize where he's from, they start calling Max "Hollywood" from then on.
• New Age Retro Hippie: Max appears to be this at first, and gets treated this way by most of the other characters. And who can blame them? Max does wear a tie-dyed T-shirt and harbors radical left-wing beliefs (such as his suspicion that Halloween is actually a conspiracy on the part of the candy companies). But he ultimately subverts the stereotype when he's offered a marijuana cigarette and he turns it down.
• The Nineties: Max's hair alone dates this movie.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: What kicks the whole plot off in the modern time when Max lights the enchanted candle, of course he didn't know the legend was real at the time but still. Binx even nearly title drops the trope name when he reveals to Max he can talk.

Binx: (sarcastically) Nice going, Max.

• Nice, Mean and In-Between: Mary, Winifred and Sarah in that order.
• No Ontological Inertia: The party-goers are cursed to dance until they die. The curse ends when the witches die.
  • Also, Binx and Billy are allowed to die.
• Not So Harmless: The Sandersons may seem comically bumbling about 80 percent of the time, but you'd be wise not to mess with them when they really get angry. Sarah in particular seems a harmless, ditzy woman through most of the movie. Then she starts singing sweetly, luring children out, and you know she's deadly.
• Oh Crap: Billy reacts in this way twice, each time just before he (literally) loses his head. It's also Mary's reaction as she sees the sun coming up (following Winnie and Sarah to their end).
• One-Scene Wonder: Those skull-faced jazzers/rockers at the Halloween party were pretty cool.
  • It may take a second viewing to realize that these performers segued from "Witchcraft" into "I Put a Spell on You" shortly before Winifred took over the show.
• Painful Transformation: Thackery Binx, intentionally invoked by the Sanderson Sisters.
• Perky Goth: Sarah, a rare villainous one.
• Pillar of Light
• Please Wake Up: Dani, to Binx. Harsher because he was immortal up until then.
• Police Are Useless: Subverted — the apparent cop who bullies the children and insults Max's manhood is only in costume.
• Product Placement: In one scene, "the Master" and his wife are tossing the Clark Bar candy bars to the Sanderson Sisters, but after discovering the weirdness of the sisters, the wife forces them to leave with the Clark Bars. Once they're back out on the prowl, Mary at first thinks that she has "a chocolate covered finger of a man named Clark", but when she eats the Clark Bar and discovers that it's candy, she asks why "the Master [would] give us candy", to which Winifred replies, "Because he's NOT our Master!"
  • Also, while still at "the Master's" house, Mary turns on the TV and sees a commercial for DuPont Stainmaster with a running baby in it, and she gets ecstatic.
• Psychopathic Womanchild: Sarah. She's so childlike, it's very easy to forget she's homicidal and very dangerous, and her idea of "play" likely involves death and, at one point, possibly torture. Sarah Jessica Parker's delivery makes her lines less creepy, until you think about them.
  • One line sums her up instantly.

Sarah: My lucky rat tail! Just where I left it!

• Really Gets Around: Sarah. It's honestly shocking for a Disney film that she flirts with every single male she comes across--from Thackery to Max to Billy to a random bus driver to Max's bullies to a random costumed man at the party...the list goes on and on. Although her idea of fun probably isn't what most men anticipate.

Sarah: Thou wouldst hate me in the morning. Bus Driver: No I wouldn't!...st. Winifred: Believe me, thou wouldst.

• Redhead in Green: Winifred.
• Resurrective Immortality: What Thackery is cursed with.
• Rule of Funny: The entire film, except for certain moments of Mood Whiplash.
• Sanity Ball: Is briefly held by Sarah and Mary when they point out to Winifred that they don't need to chase after Max and Dani because they've already got a kid to feed their potion to, and thanks to Sarah's singing more are coming to the house. They can always make more potion afterwards because they've got the book back, but Winifred's too dead set on getting back at Dani for calling her "ugly" to care.
• Satan: Never appears in person, but the Sanderson sisters call him their "master" and a museum sign claims he gave Winnifred her spell book.
• Schmuck Bait: The candle.
• See You in Hell:

Billy Butcherson: Go to Hell! Winifred: Oh! I've been there, thank you. I found it quite lovely.

• Shadow Archetype: Max begins the film extremely self-centered, over-dramatic, short-tempered and showing an enormous amount of disdain for his annoying but loving little sister. Obvious and weak comparisons are drawn with Max and Binx, but the stronger parallels are with Max and Winifred, an extremely self-centered, over-dramatic and short-tempered witch who despises her incompetent, yet devoted, younger sisters. Sarah and Mary follow Winifred into what will clearly be their own demise and die after a clumsy attempt to save her from Max, a gesture Winifred would hardly return.

Winifred: What a fool to give up thy life...for thy sister's.

• Shock and Awe: Winnie can do this on Emperor Palpatine's levels.
• Shout-Out: During the "I Put a Spell on You" number, Winnie calls out, "Hello, Salem, my name is Winifred! What's yours?" This is a nod to Mama Rose in Gypsy, who said, "Hello, world, my name is Rose! What's yours?" (which was spoken by Louise earlier) Doubles as an Actor Allusion when Bette Midler played Mama Rose in the TV version on the same year that Hocus Pocus was released.
  • At the beginning of "I Put a Spell on You", Winnie gives out a shout-out to one of Elton John's songs:

Winifred: Now the Witch with a Capital B is back! And there's hell to pay.

• • Also, the "I Put a Spell on You" number is an Homage to Screamin' Jay Hawkins, who wrote the song, although the original actually started with "I put a spell on you, because you're mine."
• Skeptic No Longer: Max.
• Sophisticated As Hell: Binx snarling "Nice going, Max!" in his standard 17th-century Colonial accent.
• Spell Book: Bound in human skin, and emblazoned with a living human eye, no less.
• The Stinger: A number of them, actually. After we see Thackery and Emily finally reunited at the gates of Heaven, the end credits are accompanied by the following: Max and Dani's parents and all the other townspeople stumbling out of the town hall in their costumes, with the dad commenting that "I thought L.A. was a party town!"; Jay and Ice still locked in birdcages in the Sandersons' lair, pitifully singing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" to pass the time; and a final tip-off that the Sanderson sisters may be Not Quite Dead.
• Surrounded by Idiots:

Winifred: WHY? Why was I cursed with such IDIOT sisters? Sarah: Just lucky, I guess.

• • Binx as well. Max, Dani and Allison are about as sharp as bowling balls.
• Take a Third Option: At the end, Max either has to give up the potion or Dani dies. What does he do? He drinks the potion instead.
• Take Me Instead!: Max drinks the potion to keep Winifred from force-feeding it to Dani. "What a fool to give up thy life... for thy sister's."
• Taken for Granite: Winifred... the result of her standing on "hallowed ground"... which was a big no-no when trying to steal Max's life.
• Talking Animal: Binx.
• Title Drop: "C'mon, it's all just a bunch of hocus pocus."
• Together in Death: Binx's spirit reunited with his sister in the afterlife.
• Tome of Eldritch Lore: Winifred's spellbook. Bound in human skin (complete with human eyeball) and given to her by Satan himself. Plus, it's at least partially sentient.
• Too Dumb to Live: Sarah and Mary Sanderson, though Winifred preceded them both.
  • The kids count, too.
• Undeath Always Ends: Thackery's cursed immortality at the end, along with his sister, who has apparently been a ghost for 300 years.
• Unusual Euphemism: "Yabbos", to describe what Max loves.
• Villain Ball: Winnie holds it pretty hard at some points, but the worst is when the three sisters have everything they need to win, at least temporarily — enough potion to suck the lives of at least one child, which would give them enough time to live at least past Halloween and make more, plus the spellbook and a whole crowd of children on which to use it, and Winnie gives up the perfect opportunity to go get the life of one specific child, who called her "ugly." However, it's fairly justified, as Winnie had been shown many times beforehand to be vain, self-centered, arrogant and vindictive — perfectly in-character to drop everything for meaningless revenge, while her unassertive and incompetent sisters are hardly able to dissuade her.
  • This could probably be her one true Idiot Ball moment too.
• Villain Song: Two, "I Put A Spell On You", and the later "Come Little Children".
  • "Come Little Children" also opened the movie in Salem 300 years earlier.
• Virgin Power:

Max: (after feeling the room shake) What happened? Dani: A virgin (referring to Max) lit the candle.

• What Happened to the Mouse?: What happened to the three girls who got the Sandersons' brooms?
  • Well, you can hear a *whoosh* sound after they run off-camera.
  • Assuming the brooms had been around since the sisters were alive back in 1693 and if some kids tried to fly on the brooms but failed in the past, then with the sister's resurrection the magic has returned to them and stays. But what if the girls were flying at sunrise when the magic could leave...
  • The last we saw of Max's house was the Sanderson Sisters completely destroying the top floor. One wonders what his parents will think when they finally get home.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Happens to Binx in the beginning. Not that he wanted it in the first place.
  • Living Forever Is Awesome: You might think the Sanderson sisters are Vain Sorceresses but eternal youth is only half of what they want.

Winifred: We want to live forever. Not just until tomorrow!

• Wicked Witch: Three of them.
• Witch with a Capital B: Winnie does this in a nod to Elton John during "I Put a Spell on You"; see Shout-Out.
• Would Hurt a Child: The Sanderson Sisters drain Emily's life.
• Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe: The Sanderson Sisters, and Thackery and Emily Binx, and the rest of the Salem townsfolk in 1693.
  • Played with on the bus:

Sarah: Thou wouldst hate me in the morning. Bus Driver: No I wouldn'st!

• Your Princess Is in Another Castle: For a little while, it seems that the witches have been cooked in the school oven. They were, but it didn't stick.
• Zombie Apocalypse: Averted; it's just one zombie and he's not exactly evil.
• Zombie Gait: Billy's silly zombie stumble.

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Virgin.