Two years before Disney made the animated classic Aladdin, they produced this cheap ass live-action version for The Disney Channel directed by none other than former Monkee, Micky Dolenz! Normally, I would never have bothered to watch something like this, but since it was made fun of by the guys at Rifftrax, it had to be seen to be believed. As usual, Mike, Kevin, and Bill have snuffed out a real doozy of a bad movie.
Aladdin (Brent Sudduth) is a poor boy living in China who, by chance, happens to meet the emperor’s daughter, Mei Ling (Susan Egan). Naturally, it’s love at first sight, but the emperor will only allow her to marry the richest man in China. Opportunity presents itself when a slimy magician (Richard Kiley) manipulates Aladdin into stealing a magic lamp. When he rubs it, a genie (Barry Bostwick) comes out and grants him wishes, and of course, he wishes for riches so he can get Mei Ling’s hand in marriage. The villain then schemes to get the lamp back and ruin Aladdin’s wedding.
This is a real jaw dropper. I have seen plenty of bad kids’ movies before (Super Buddies, anyone?), but this is truly… something. First of all, it’s Aladdin, but it takes place in… China?!? It’s like they built all the sets for a Mulan movie and then decided at the last minute to make it an Aladdin flick instead. The results are perplexing to say the least. Also, all the Chinese and (a handful of) Arabian characters are played by Caucasians. This isn’t so much politically incorrect as it is baffling.
The movie really belongs to Barry Bostwick. Watching him mince around in a turban singing dinner theater level songs for an hour will test the most ardent fan of bad movies. Even weirder is the fact that he shows up late in the picture playing the genie’s twin brother as sort of a cross between a gangster and a used car salesman.
That’s not to mention the awful early ‘90s computer effects. Or the horrible songs. It’s tempting to blame Dolenz for a lot of this, but I don’t know if Spielberg himself could’ve saved this mess. It’s all enough to make you want to grab a magic lamp and wish you never saw it.
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