Liche's Wish

Liche's Wish is a 1990 American animated musical fantasy adventure comedy-drama film directed by Audel LaRoque (in his directorial debut) from a screenplay by himself, Michael Wildshill, Cynthia Marion, and Dianne Dixon. Featuring the voices of Melissa Fahn, Aaron Lohr, Helen Hunt, Kelly Preston, Sean Penn, and Dom DeLuise, the film follows a neurotic mermaid named Liche who attempts to break from her totalitarian society while trying to win the affection of a human she loves.

Liche's Wish was the first film under Multimedia Animation, which was formerly known as Michael Wildshill Productions before being brought by Multimedia in 1988. The film was released theatrically by Universal Pictures on November 16, 1990, the same day as Disney's The Rescuers Down Under, as well as 20th Century Fox's Home Alone. It received mixed-to-negative reviews from critics; most criticism was of the poor storytelling, generic songs, and worldbuilding problems, with several negative comparisons to Disney's The Little Mermaid, while the animation and voice performances were mostly praised. The film earned $17 million on an $23 million budget, making it a box office disappointment, but it was later successful on home video, becoming one of the biggest-selling VHS releases ever. The film, alongside Jetsons: The Movie, marked the first time Universal released two animated feature films in the same year.

Despite the film's lackluster box office performance, its success on home video prompted Universal to distribute further more Wildshill films including East of the Sun and West of the Moon (1992) and Romeo and Juliet (1994), and eventually help Wildshill set up a feature animation department for the studio.

Plot
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Voice cast

 * Melissa Fahn as Liche, an idealistic young mermaid.
 * Aaron Lohr as Don Clark, a human who is Gloria's fiancée and Liche's love interest.
 * Helen Hunt as Gloria, an arrogant human who is Liche's rival. She is also the fiancé of Don Clark.
 * Kelly Preston as Harmony, Liche's best friend.
 * Sean Penn as Coral, another friend of Liche's.
 * Dom DeLuise as Willow, a dolphin whom Liche befriends.
 * Cynthia Marion as Tuffy
 * Hamilton Camp as Fish
 * Will Ryan as Marvin
 * Frank Welker as Octopus

Additional Voices

 * Tom Abbott
 * Bob Cokinn
 * Judi Durand
 * Greg Finley
 * J.D. Hall
 * Barbara Iley
 * Daamen Krall
 * Audel LaRoque
 * Christina MacGregor
 * Cynthia Marion
 * David McCharen
 * David Randolph
 * Noreen Reardon
 * Alicia Tabitha Redford
 * Jack Reed
 * Peter Renaday
 * Lester Schmidt
 * Gary Schwartz
 * Vernon Scott
 * Susan Silo
 * Bryant Summers
 * Stan Webb
 * Frank Welker
 * Michael Wildshill
 * Leo Wolfe

Development
Plans for an animated film involving mermaids dated as far back as during the production of The Master of Colors in 1979, where Michael Wildshill was interested in working on his own adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale The Little Mermaid, following closer to the original story with the original and tragic ending. Though character designs by Cynthia Marion survive, the film was never put into production or animation tests in favor of Gools. The concept was revived by Wildshill and Marion during the production of Gools in 1984. They developed the working title A Fish's Tail and drew inspiration from the success of the live-action comedy Splash directed by Ron Howard. The designs of the mermaids in Disney's Peter Pan also influenced this film's mermaid designs.

Production began in November 1984, with Will Finn as the initial director of the film, being later joined by Audel LaRoque, who had left Wildshill's former employer Disney as story artist during the production of The Great Mouse Detective (1986). However, Finn left the project due to creative difficulties, making LaRoque the sole director. LaRoque, Wildshill and Marion wrote the original screenplay of the film, before future Gabriel Garza writer Dianne Dixon came on board to do several rewrites for the script. Melissa Fahn was cast in the lead role of Liche, after having turned down for the role as Ariel in Disney's The Little Mermaid, a similar animated film which was released a year before Liche's Wish.

When the film was nearing completion, media company Multimedia acquired Michael Wildshill Productions in February 1988, renaming the studio to Multimedia Animation as the feature animation division of Multimedia Motion Pictures.

Music
The original music for the film was composed by James Horner, who previously did the score for The Workers.

Release
Tri-Star Pictures originally expressed an interest in distributing Liche's Wish for a Christmas 1989 release. However, when Multimedia purchased Michael Wildshill Productions and its assets in early 1988, the film ended up in the hands of Universal Pictures, who then rescheduled the film to November 1990. This marked the first collaboration between Wildshill and Universal since Gools in 1984.

The film was a production by Multimedia Motion Pictures. Universal handled U.S. distribution, while Multimedia Motion Pictures Worldwide handled international distribution. NBCUniversal handles the broadcasting rights of the film to be aired on their variety of television networks (including NBC and Gingo). Universal now handles both domestic and international theatrical and home media rights via Universal Pictures and television distribution and syndication rights to the film via NBCUniversal Television Distribution as a result of the Multimedia/MCA merger on January 31, 1996.

Box office
Liche's Wish did poorly at the box office, grossing a little over $17.1 million against a $23 million budget, mainly because it was overshadowed by The Rescuers Down Under and Home Alone which both were released on the same day. However, the movie became popular among audiences and later gained a cult following through home video releases.

Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes the film has a rating of 32% based on 17 reviews, with an average rating of 5.11/10. On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 40 out of 100 based on 34 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews."

Home media
Liche's Wish got its first home video release on VHS and LaserDisc on July 2, 1991, by MCA/Universal Home Video. The film became a sleeper hit due to its home video release; a strong promotional campaign helped it become one of the top-selling VHS releases of all time, selling over 3 million copies in its first month. This was declared a success by Universal which subsequently distributed Michael Wildshill's next two films East of the Sun and West of the Moon (1992) and Romeo and Juliet (1994); Wildshill would start working at Universal's own animation department.

In 1997, Universal rereleased the film on home video. A DVD version was made available for the first time on November 13, 2001.

Main transcript
To see the transcript of the film, click here.

Trailer transcripts
To see the transcripts for the trailers of the film, click here.