When I was little, I was starved for fantasy. I didn't have access to fantasy books or roleplaying games, or of course movies. So when I first saw Willow, I thought it was the greatest thing in the world. It had swords, magic, dragons, all that good stuff. Who cares if the title character was incredibly annoying, if it had childish comic relief that wasn't even remotely funny, and if the plot was rather lame. It was fantasy, damnit, and I was gonna like it!
But of course as time past and I grew more used to fantasy, I started to realize that Willow actually sucks. It was quite a startling revelation. Not even Val Kilmer really does a good job, and every other actor in it just sucks. The plot is lame and completely unoriginal, and has several plot holes and mistakes.
As much as I hate to do it, I seriously have to defer to the Rabid Aardvark's review. He mentions all the things I would love to, like how small the world is and especially how no-one is ever really sure what the hell the name of the dwarves is in the first place.
However, the 'Vark doesn't seem to have come to terms with the total crappiness of this movie, at least as of this writing. He still insists that somehow it's worthy of re-watching, and of being called the best fantasy movie of all time. While it's not as bad as many fantasy movies I've heard about, it is quite lame and definitely not the best ever.
This movie does however retain one moment of pure joy. One little bit of this movie that makes it worth re-watching, and then throw in a bit of audience participation, Rocky Horror-style. When Willow is leaving town and his bitch says "I miss you already" you absolutely have to repeat "already" with her and try to fake her lame accent.
Other than that, watch this movie and groan.