| CUT SCENES |
| The Battle in the Valley |
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When Willow tries to give Elora to Airk at the Daikini Crossroads, Airk refuses to take
her because he is going into battle. In this scene, Willow becomes an accidental witness
to this battle as he travels between the fairy forest and the tavern.
This major scene was actually filmed. Shooting big battle scenes is an expensive proposition, and I wonder if George Lucas cringed when he edited it out. It was probably for the best, though. All the sources agree that the tavern scene and the wagon chase come immediately after the battle, and those sequences aren't exactly dull. It's possible to clutter up a movie with too much action, and if this battle was in there too it might have gone over the threshold. The audience would have less emotional involvement in the battle than in the other action scenes because neither of the two primary heroes are direct participants. Don't get me wrong; this scene sounds very cool and I'd love to see it. But I think it would better in a DVD cut scenes library than in the movie itself. |
| Late Script Excerpt |
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FRANJEAN: Of course! With us as your guides no harm will befall you.
ROOL: Death below! Rool points through the trees. Willow hurries down the hill to the tree-line. In the valley below, hundreds of NOCKMAAR SOLDIERS and CAVALRYMEN battle a ragtag squad of REBEL TROOPS. Weapons clash and men fall to their deaths. WILLOW: Daikinis... In the valley, the outpowered rebels are being forced up the hill toward them. Willow hears a CLANK beside him and looks up. He is surrounded by several large horses and black-armored minions. Willow is frozen in fear, but they don't notice him. Their leader is GENERAL KAEL. He is a huge powerful and cruel Neanderthal. KAEL: Hyaaaaahh!! No mercy! Swords flash and the horsemen charge! The brownies jump and run for their lives. Willow stumbles and spins as horse after horse thunders past him, nearly trampling him. Elora is shrieking in terror. He holds her tight and runs for the tree-line, following the brownies, while the Nockmaar reinforcements descend upon the rebels and crush them. WILLOW: Shhh, don't cry, Elora. Things can't get any worse than this... EXT. ROAD - DAY Bleak rain dribbles down Willow's miserable face as he treks along, trying to protect the baby. |
| Graphic Novel Illustrations |
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| Novelization Excerpt |
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They kept to the high ground; Willow was soon to wish they had been even higher.
Near noon, Rool crouched suddenly and hissed, slapping Willow on the leg. "Death below!" They took cover in a shallow crevasse with charred shrubbery in front. Cautiously, Willow peered through this screen and down the slope. All morning weird sounds had echoed and rebounded, surrounding them with the clamor of a ghostly battle. Now at last the real battle swirled into view. Clutching Elora close, Willow watched in horror. The remnants of the majestic force he had seen pass through the Daikini Crossroads were being driven down the valley in a rout. All semblance of order had vanished. The banners had fallen, the baggage train had been captured. Only the pennant of the commander was still aloft where Airk Thaughbaer and his standard-bearer, besieged by a sea of Nockmaar troops, fought desperately. All around them men died, pinned by lances, hacked by swords, crushed under thrashing hooves. So horrified was Willow, and so loud was the clash of battle, that he was unaware of the approach of Nockmaar horsemen behind him until he heard a harsh bellow. "No quarter! Kill the scum!" Willow cowered over the child, expecting to be struck down the next instant, but when no blow fell on him he peeked around. The man who had spoken was mounted on an enormous black stallion. The crimson ensign of the Nockmaar commander fluttered from the staff of his standard-bearer. A purple cape drifted from his shoulders. Black plate and chainmail covered his thick torso and his huge arms and legs. Splashes of blood stained his sword and gauntlet. But the most terrifying aspect of this man was not his size. Where a human head should have rested there rose a massive skull, a thing with glowering sockets and an immense, protruding jaw ringed with fangs. A scrap of rank black hair clung to it. A pair of iron horns arced from its forehead. As Willow stared, the rider lifted off this terrible helment to reveal a face almost as terrible - a face thickened and brutalized by savagery. A face scarred and broken. A face beyond all pity. He was oblivious to Willow and the brownies. His gaze was riveted on the battle in the valley below. "Galladoorn scum!" he growled. "Clean them up! Charge when ready!" "Yes, General Kael!" One of the two adjutants with him wheeled his mount and trotted back along the ridge, shouting commands; the other raised a ram's horn to his bearded lips and blew such a resonant, throbbing blast that Willow felt the very stones quiver under him. Over the rise trotted a legion of fresh Nockmaar cavalry, dressing themselves in battle-order as they came. When their captain's sword arm dropped they surged down the slope and over the wretched Galladoorn survivors. The howl they uttered - pure blood lust - turned Willow cold. Death Dogs charged with them, hot for the throats of men. Willow cowered while the charge went past and over him. The child shrieked such a long and piercing scream that he thought they would surely be discovered, but even that cry was lost amid the cries of dying horses and dying men, and the clang of steel on steel. As soon as the last rider had swept down into the valley, the brownies were on their feet, tugging at Willow. "This way! Hurry!" Choking in dust, they clambered to higher ground and lost themselves at last among great boulders, where horses could not follow. Death Dogs might have tracked them there, but they were busy with richer work below. They had no noses, then, for two brownies, one small Nelwyn, and a baby. Gradually the sounds of slaughter faded. Gradually Willow and the brownies found their way down through tortuous goat tracks among the crags, back onto greener slopes. Birds sang again, drifting among the trees. Gradually Willow stopped shaking enough to comfort the child. "A-awful!" he said, sinking down at the base of a great tree. Franjean's jade eyes glinted. "And they call brownies cruel! I tell you, Peck, no brownie would be part of what you've seen today." "Un-unh," Rool grunted, shaking his large ears, eyes sorrowful. "Only Nockmaars kill. Only Galladoorns. Only..." "Only the big people," Willow said. "Daikinis." The brownies nodded. Gradually their horror and fear subsided. They stayed safe in the tall woods until the exhausted child fell asleep in Willow's arms, and then they started down through lengthening shadows toward a lush valley in the distance. Lights twinkled there, although the western hillsides were washed with sun. "We've got to find food for her," Willow said. Franjean nodded. He pointed to the lights. "An inn." |
| Junior Novelization Excerpt |
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"Of course!" said Franjean. "With us as your guides no harm will befall you--"
"Death below!" Rool suddenly shrieked in terror, pointing down the hill. Willow ran toward the edge of the trees. In the valley below hundreds of Nockmaar soldiers and cavalry were fighting the ragtag squad of rebel troops Willow had seen at the crossroads. Even from here he could hear the clash of weapons and the cries of dying men. "Daikinis..." he murmured. The overpowered rebel troops were being forced up the hill toward their hiding place. Willow watched, hypnotized, until suddenly a sound made him spin around. Behind him was a troop of black-armored Nockmaar soldiers. He crouched in the bushes, frozen with fear, as the hideous face of the Nockmaar general Kael loomed above him. But Kael's attention was on the distant battle. "No mercy!" he roared. He lowered his ominous death mask over his face and spurred his horse down the hill, and the rest of the cavalry followed, closing the trap on the doomed rebels below. Willow and the brownies stumbled and scrambled for their lives, dodging horse after horse as the Nockmaar reinforcements thundered by. Elora Danan wailed and cried as Willow ran with her back through the forest, following the brownies, while behind them the Nockmaar troops descended on the rebel squad and crushed them. "Shhh, don't cry, Elora," Willow murmured, his own voice unsteady as he huddled with her in the safety of the forest. "Things can't get any worse than this..." Or could they? A few hours later, Willow was trudging along a muddy road through the rain, trying in vain to keep Elora Danan's head dry and feeling utterly miserable. Up ahead through the gray mist he could see a tavern, its open bottom story stabling several horses. A decrepit wagon sat in the yard while someone worked in the rain to repair it. Willow walked faster, heading toward the welcome shelter. |
| Willow Sticker Album |
[The text in the sticker album doesn't mention the battle, but
the stickers include a photo that's obviously from this scene.]
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| The Making of Willow TV Documentary |
| Around the time the movie was released, a half-hour documentary about the making of the movie was shown on television. The documentary provided a brief glimpse of the filming of this battle scene. Here are some screen caps taken from this footage: |
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| Cast Report |
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[From the Patrick Roach interview in the Official Movie Magazine:]
Those battles, notes Roach, are overwhelming. "I should think they had some of the biggest battle scenes that one will ever see--many, many hundreds of horses. I think they scraped up every horse in New Zealand--unbelievable." [This may be a reference to the battle in question. The Making of Willow TV documentary didn't specify where the cut battle scene was filmed, but it did include a large number of horses. The battle was filmed outdoors in an open, hilly area unlike the countryside around Tir Asleen or Nockmaar. Those two battles were primarily filmed on sets in England that did not have sufficient room for hundreds of horses. The Nockmaar exteriors were filmed in Wales. I don't know where the Tir Asleen exteriors were filmed.] |