I love Labyrinth because it became a piece of my adolescence, not only that but there are many things to it that I adore.  As a child I always had a fondness for puppetry.  I had also loved fantasy stories that reflect reality in a surreal way like The Wizard of Oz and Alice's adventures in Wonderland.

The very first time I saw Labyrinth was in Kindergarden, during recess.  It was rainy so they had 'Indoor audiotorium' where the kids watched a movie in the school movie theatre.  They had Labyrinth.  I don't recall much about what I saw of it except that I remember trying to immitate the helping hands with my own hands.  I don't think it interested me much at the time, I was only four or five and it was less than a year after the film had come out.

 When I was twelve I was flipping through the channels one night, watching television with my mother and I happened upon Labyrinth on the Disney Channel (back when they had no commercial breaks) just as they were crossing The Bog of Eternal Stench. My mother laughed and said of Ludo 'Is that thing farting?'  I turned on the cable box's display which said it starred David Bowie.  My mother knew him to be a rock star of the eighties. 

Well, my cousin and best friend, Jesse, loved eighties rock and I spoke to her on the phone the next day.  She was very into Queen and had made me hear Under Pressure (which I love) which has both Freddie Mercury and David Bowie singing together.  I told her about the film and what little I had seen of it (since it was more than half over when I had turned it on that first time).

So I decided to tape it for her.  I video taped Labyrinth for her the next time it was on but I liked it, a lot. She never got that VHS tape... That summer I became a David Bowie fan.  When I went to Vermont with my Cousin a year later I listened to The Rise and fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars for the very first time and it blew my mind.  Through my entire teenagehood I had Labyrinth, David Bowie, Tim Burton's The Nightmare before Christmas and Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles to see me thorugh it.

Labyrinth was not available on VHS tape for most of the nineties.  I recall looking everywhere for it on VHS and finally renting a copy from a place called Royal Video and just not returning it (paying a fine).  And then my little brother (Jeff) happened upon a used copy at a pharmecy for sale.  It was the 1991 Nelson release of Labyrinth (which has a similar box to the original release but the back of the box is black with a rectangle cut out of it and no text on the back of the box).

I recall the summr of 1997 Jesse and I at a mall and she spotted the Labyrinth soundtrack and said 'Mandy.'  And I only half paid attention and she said 'Mandy, Run!'  As if the thing would disappear.  She had found the Labyrinth soundtrack.

I found a wig similar to Jareth's (actually from 1986) used at a party supply store that was going out of business.  I recall pretty much doing a karoke to Magic Dance while wearing that wig and dancing on a bed for Jesse.

The in 1999 Labyrinth was re-released to VHS tape and finally came to DVD.  The VHS tape at that time was 13.99.

And now here we are, and I'm twenty-six-years-old and still love that film.

I love it because I've always been fond of puppetry, when I was nine I wanted to be a puppeteer.  And I had quite a collection of puppets.

I love it for the surreal Wizard Of Oz style fantasy.

I love it for Jareth, mostly for Jareth, for David Bowie's music and the charisma of his character.  The film is and will always be magical.

Reference: Return to Labyrinth Vol 1