The Turning Point of "The Last Unicorn"

“The Last Unicorn” (1982, but not released in Germany until 1983) was the first movie I ever saw in a movie theatre, so, yes, the nostalgia is strong in this post. It’s, however, also a movie which I’ve seen several times afterwards (on TV, on DVD) and it never lost its magic for me. Perhaps because, unlike your regular Disney movie, it does have quite some adult themes while at the same time also delivering enough to keep a child happy and interested.

What I want to talk about here is the turning point of the final battle, which I feel is extremely well done in the movie. I will also talk about the movie, not the novel by Peter S. Beagle (which I read once as a teen, but do no longer own). However, from what I can remember, movie and novel are relatively close, although the novel can, of course, produce some more content than a 92-minute movie.

To make the turning point understandable, though, I need to give you a summary of the story, so this is where I’ll start.

The movie starts out with two hunters in a forest, the older one telling the younger one that they won’t find prey in it, because a unicorn lives there. He’s also sure that the unicorn is the last one and no others exist any longer. For the last unicorn this is ridiculous - just the fact that humans haven’t seen unicorns for a long time doesn’t mean there aren’t any others around. But then, the story is reinforced by a butterfly who tells her the story of the red bull (this, kids, was before energy drinks were invented) and its master King Haggard who captured all unicorns and is keeping them imprisoned somewhere.

The unicorn decides to leave her forest (I will use ‘she’ in this case, both because the unicorn is voiced by Mia Farrow and because it eventually is turned into a woman) and search the world for more unicorns. On her way, she is captured by Mommy Fortuna, an old witch who creates false legendary creatures for her carnival. She has two real exhibits - the unicorn and a harpy. This is where the unicorn meets Schmendrick - a luckless wizard whose magic is erratic at best. While they escape the carnival, we first get to see the unicorn fight, driving away the freed harpy. A third member joins the group when Molly Grue, member of a group of bandits, recognizes the unicorn for what she is.

Schmendrick, Molly, and the unicorn finally reach the lands of King Haggard and on their first night’s rest, they are confronted by the red bull. When it becomes apparent that the unicorn isn’t a match for the bull and in danger of sharing the others’ fate, Schmendrick (who is far more powerful than he thinks, but lacks confidence) lets his magic run free and it transforms the unicorn into a woman. At first, the unicorn fears to go mad in the mortal, human body, but she can be convinced that this is the best way to approach King Haggard and find out where the others are. King Haggard is weary of them, but agrees to let them stay as servants for him and his son, Prince Lir.

Prince Lir falls for the Lady Amalthea (the last unicorn) and in time, as she loses her unicorn side more and more, she starts to fall for him, too. King Haggard tells Amalthea that the unicorns are imprisoned in the ocean, driven in there by the red bull and kept in there by their fear of him. The bull must be vanquished for the unicorns to be freed - and the last unicorn becoming more and more human means that it must happen quickly. Finally, they find a way into the lair, but the way back is destroyed by King Haggard. To this day, I’m not sure when exactly Prince Lir followed them, but this is a fairy tale, so I give it some leeway.

This time, the red bull no longer falls for the trick and recognizes the unicorn in Amalthea (which is a bit of a surprise, given she’s much less of one). During the escape, Schmendrick is forced to return her to her real form. The last unicorn flees from the red bull across the beach. For a while, it looks like all is lost (as it should - black moment and all). Finally, Lir (who is a full-fledged hero even before the unicorn turns up) tries to protect her by stepping into the way of the red bull - and gets killed. That is the turning point I’ve worked my way up to here.

Seeing Lir dead on the sand, the last unicorn’s stance changes. Instead of running away, she turns towards the bull - who, apparently, never has encountered resistance from the unicorns before. With a glowing horn (which we’ve seen before during the fight with the harpy), she drives it back, step by step, until the bull’s hoof lands in the ocean. Since the red bull is made of flames, there’s a hiss, even though the water doesn’t douse the flames. Driven further in, the bull turns around and walks into the ocean, just as the flood sets in. Carried to the land, the unicorns this time dare the last step and pour from the ocean onto the beach, running back into the world proper. As the first one jumps on the stone pathway leading to the castle, the castle crumbles to the sea, taking the sole occupant, King Haggard, with it (the animal occupants clearly get out, as the cat and the horses are later seen).

The last unicorn, though, stays back and brings Lir back to life. It’s only then she leaves - and she comes back to speak to Schmendrick a little later, telling him that she forgives him for making her a human and that she is a little afraid of going back, because now she’s not like the other unicorns any longer, having been human for a while. The movie ends with her returning back home to her forest, awaited eagerly by the animals she protected before and will protect again now.

You can read the turning point simply as the last unicorn growing stronger when the man she loves (this being only a short time after she’s turned back into a unicorn) dies trying to protect her. She doesn’t care about the death of humans before, yet the death of Prince Lir changes her stance. It’s a sign of her growth for me - in the meantime, she has acquired humanity, something she didn’t have before. She makes full use of her powers and hers are much stronger than those of the red bull (despite it being about twice her width and twice her height - the bull is massive).

The unicorn is always considered a very powerful legendary creature (and a bloodthirsty one to boot in the legends), symbolizing spring and fighting with the lion. They are powerful creatures, but clearly, within the story, not aware of how much power they have, otherwise another of the thousands of unicorns we see pouring from the sea would have stood up to the bull. It took a unicorn who was different to do this.

The movie has a great cast, but for me, Sir Christopher Lee (voicing King Haggard) stood out most when I first watched it - simply because he’s the only member of the original English cast who also voiced their German version (Sir Christopher was fluent in several languages, including German). Today, I’d say that Haggard might have had some form of depression, because he voices more than once than only the unicorns ever made him happy. Nevertheless, his cruelty in keeping them imprisoned in the ocean, knowing they were afraid of returning to land because of the red bull, makes it hard to feel sorry for him. He never shows regret for what he has done and is a classic villain who dies without redemption or regret.

The most persistent part of the movie in pop culture, though, is the title song “The Last Unicorn” by America which has been covered numerous times by other artists.

Now, as an adult, I watch the movie occasionally and with other eyes than the eight-year-old girl in that movie theatre which doesn’t even exist any longer. It holds a place in my heart for having been the first movie I ever saw on the big screen, but it also holds a place in my heart for its very strong visuals and multi-layered story.