

Nell Minow of wrote that “Hocus Pocus 2” would “make fans of all generations happy.” Though it’s been nearly 30 years, all three bring the same verve to their performances, gamely swooning and shrieking around the screen, and leaning into the film’s “Three Stooges”-style slapstick with aplomb. “Hocus Pocus 2” director Anne Fletcher (“The Proposal”) clearly understands that Midler, Najimy, and Parker are the main attraction, waiting less than 30 minutes to bring the trio back from the dead. On her 16th birthday, Becca accidentally summons the Sanderson sisters again with yet another cursed ’s review of “Hocus Pocus 2” gave the film three stars out of four, praising the peformances of Midler, Najimy, and Parker. Viewers learn that the siblings, ostracized by the village, seek refuge in the nearby woods, where they’re taken under the wing of the powerful Mother Witch (Hannah Waddingham).įlash forward 330 years and we meet a group of friends-Becca (Whitney Peak), Izzy (Belissa Escobedo), and Cassie (Lilia Buckingham)-splintered by high school politics. Hocus Pocus 2 serves as both a prequel and a sequel, opening in 1653 Salem on the origin story of the Sanderson sisters.
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Read more: The 100 Best Movies Under 2 Hours How the new movie compares to the original (Kirschner stayed on as a writer and producer.) At the time, D’Angelo was assigned the job of finding a way to bring back the original witches-Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy-who now reappear in the sequel alongside Doug Jones as the affable zombie Billy Butcherson. In October 2019, it became official: Hocus Pocus 2 was happening, and Jen D’Angelo would be writing the script. When producer and co-writer Kirschner first pitched the sequel to Disney, it took six months of waiting before the studio even passed on the project-so they brought it to Freeform instead. Since 2011, the movie has made more than $1 million in DVD sales every October alone. After Hocus Pocus was released on DVD in 2002, DVD sales crept up too. Over the years, Disney Channel and Freeform (formerly ABC Family) integrated the movie into their Halloween lineups, and it gradually climbed up the ratings. “It changes tone as casually as the actors don their masquerade costumes, and has no scruples about breaking its own mood altogether.” “Apparently too much eye of newt got into the formula for ‘Hocus Pocus,’ transforming a potentially wicked Bette Midler vehicle into an unholy mess,” wrote the New York Times. With a budget of $28 million, Hocus Pocus brought in about $45 million globally, and was panned across the board by critics at the time. The now-favorite was, by all accounts, a box office flop. ( There was talk that Disney didn’t want the film to compete with its other Halloween movie that year, The Nightmare Before Christmas, which came out in mid-October.) Hocus Pocus was no instant success-due in part, perhaps, to its mid-July theatrical release. Read More: The 52 Most Anticipated Movies of Fall 2022 How Hocus Pocus was received A dozen writers worked on the script in the years that followed. In 1984, Kirschner pitched the idea to Walt Disney Studios, pouring candy corn on the table, hanging broomsticks from the ceiling, and putting up hand-drawn pictures of black cats.
