In 10 frenzied years of production, Disney has maintained a remarkable batting average with its cartoon musicals. The studio's industrious marketeers have also proven themselves wizards at weaving theatrical and video reissues of older animated features from the 1930s through the '70s in between the new hits, turning Disney animation into one of the strongest brand names in the movie business.
In all that time, the company never got around to reissuing THE BLACK CAULDRON ($26.99), an expensive 1985 nonmusical 'toon that fared so poorly with audiences on its initial release that there was talk of shuttering the studio's animation department completely. Now that there are virtually no titles left in the back catalog that haven't been released on video, the company has stooped to slapping its insultingly ubiquitous ''Masterpiece'' label on Cauldron and has launched it into the marketplace, hoping it'll float on a decade's worth of good will.
Under the direction of Ted Berman and Richard Rich, Cauldron was cobbled together by a dispirited staff in the last days before Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg arrived to jazz up the division again (they hit their stride with 1989's The Little Mermaid). The spotty result is that rare bird: a Disney cartoon with no heart. It's based on a series of mid-'60s fantasy novels for kids by Lloyd Alexander set in medieval Wales, and a desperate desire to ape the success of Star Wars and the Indiana Jones movies is all over every frame. John Hurt voices a Darth Vader clone, the Horned King, against whom callow young Taran (Grant Bardsley), blank-eyed Princess Eilonwy (Susan Sheridan), and plucky, irksome sidekick Gurgi (John Byner) must prove themselves. Despite some adroit draftsmanship, which holds up decently on TV even though Cauldron is cropped from the original wide-screen shape, the segments have no narrative cohesion. One wretchedly uninspired interlude involves a group of tiny fairies reminiscent of the Smurfs -- dive for that fast-forward button. Throughout the film, the pointedly PG atmosphere -- bleeding lips, busty women, and rotting flesh abound -- just seems intrusive instead of genuinely adult. As a rental, Cauldron is a passable curio, but it's inconceivable that anybody would need to bring this murky brew home to own. C-
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