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The Phantom Tollbooth
Poster for The Phantom Tollbooth
Directed by	Chuck Jones Abe Levitow Dave Monahan (live action)
Produced by	Chuck Jones
Written by	Norton Juster Sam Rosen
Starring	Butch Patrick Mel Blanc Daws Butler Candy Candido Hans Conried June Foray Patti Gilbert Shepard Menken Cliff Norton Larry Thor Les Tremayne Michael Earl
Music by	Dean Elliott
Cinematography	Lester Shorr
Editing by	William Faris
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date(s)	November 7, 1970
Running time	90 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

The Phantom Tollbooth is a live-action/animated film based on Norton Juster's 1961 children's book The Phantom Tollbooth. This film was produced by Chuck Jones and the live action portions by fellow Termite Terrace alum Dave Monahan, produced by MGM Animation/Visual Arts, and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to movie theatres in 1970. It was the last feature film with animation released by MGM (who would return to the animation business to release their first fully animated film The Secret of NIMH 12 years later). It is also the only non-animated film to credit Chuck Jones as a director.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer held the film up for release until 1970 due to internal problems (the live action sequences were filmed in early 1968) and the animation studio closed soon afterwards with MGM leaving the animation business for good. Juster had no input into the film adaptation, and has stated that he is not particularly fond of it.^[1]

Contents 1 Plot 2 Cast 3 Differences from the book 4 Home releases 5 External links 6 References

[edit] Plot

Milo, a bored, lonely boy who lives in a San Francisco apartment block all by himself, is surprised by the sudden arrival of a large, gift-wrapped package. Inside is a tollbooth, which turns out to be a gateway into a magical parallel universe. As Milo passes through the tollbooth, the character moves from live action to animation, and his toy car transports him to the enchanted Kingdom of Wisdom and the cities of Digitopolis and Dictionopolis.

Accompanied by a watchdog called Tock (because he has a large clock face embedded in his body), Milo has a series of adventures in places like the Mountains of Ignorance, the Doldrums, Dictionopolis, Digitopolis, and the Castle in the Air. Together they must rescue the Princesses Rhyme and Reason, who are being held captive in Castle in the Air, and restore order to the Kingdom of Wisdom. The many eccentric characters they meet include the noisy Dr. Dischord, the Mathemagician, King Azaz, the Senses Taker, and Officer Short Shrift.

[edit] Cast

• Butch Patrick - Milo
• Mel Blanc - Officer Short Shrift, The Dodecahedron, The Demon of Insincerity
• Daws Butler - Whether Man, The Terrible Trivium, The Gelationous Giant, Senses Taker
• Candy Candido - Awful Dynne
• Hans Conried - King Azaz, The Mathemagician
• June Foray - Princess of Pure Reason, Faintly Macabre, voice of Ralph
• Patti Gilbert - Princess of Sweet Rhyme
• Shepard Menken - Spelling Bee, Chroma the Great
• Cliff Norton - Kakofonous A. Dischord, Tollbooth Speaker
• Larry Thor - Tock the Watchdog
• Les Tremayne - Humbug
• Thurl Ravenscroft, Mel Blanc - The Lethargians

[edit] Differences from the book

The movie has three major differences from the story in the book. The first is when Milo enters the Kingdom of Wisdom, the location he comes from once leaving the Tollbooth is the other side of the mountain he must reach the top of at the end of the movie. In the book Milo finds himself in a desert like highway which has a road leading up the mountain. The second difference is the appearance of Tock, who appears as a normal dog. In the book Tock is a "watchdog", a giant dog that is bigger than a human with a clock as their body. Another difference from the movie is Tock's explanation of his name, in which it is missing entirely in the movie. In the book, when Milo meets Tock, soon after the two enter the Kingdom of Wisdom Tock explains how he got his name, which was the result of a mix up with his parents. Tock was born at the same time as his brother, Tick. His parents originally wanted to name Tock "Tick" instead but mixed the two names up on the birth certificates therefore being unable to legally change the names. Alec Bings, the Soundkeeper, and the Island of Conclusions also don't appear, and the Humbug is depicted as a tall and lanky grasshopper rather than the rotund, beetle-like appearance he had in the book. Another notable difference is that the whether mans role is slightly expanded as he flies Milo back down fom the castle in the air using his baloons as opposed to tock in the original book. The Demons of Ignorance have a more antagonist role in the movie then in the book, leading to a climatic battle which several demons merge into a single monstrosity whereas Tock is presumed dead after the fight but is received by the Princesses.

[edit] Home releases

A VHS version of the film was released in 1992 by Turner Entertainment. They have not announced a DVD for this film yet.

[edit] External links

• The Phantom Tollbooth at the Internet Movie Database

[edit] References