Movies: The Neverending Story

Time for a heavy dose of '80s nostalgia today; "The Neverending Story" is a classic children's fantasy film loosely adapted from a German novel by Michael Ende. It tells the tale-within-a-tale of Atreyu, a warrior out to save the land of Fantasia from a horrific "Nothing" that threatens to devour the world. Reading his story is the lonely Bastian, a downtrodden modern day youth who finds a curious book called "The Neverending Story."

Any kid who grew up when this movie was on VHS probably got to see it quite a bit in school, mostly because of the positive "reading is entertaining" message that's implicit throught. Everybody plays it straight, and I thought Noah Hathaway did a phenomenal job as Atreyu. The film is also gifted with a memorable score from Giorgio Moroder, including the famous theme "Bastian's Happy Flight," which is probably my favorite traveling montage music of all time:



Of course, no "Neverending Story" post would be complete without the infamous cornball music video from Limahl...



...And the "Family Guy" parody...