John Huston, nearing the end of his life and career, took a supporting role as the guardian of time in a German-Italian children’s fantasy. It would be his final theatrical role released during his lifetime.

An orphan girl lives in the ruins of a Roman amphitheater, befriended by the working people of her neighborhood. When gray-suited agents from a mysterious corporation arrive offering to bank citizens’ time for later use, the townspeople grow busy, efficient, and friendless, severed from their children and elders.

MOMO (1986) adapts the 1973 novel by Michael Ende, who also wrote The Neverending Story. Johannes Schaaf directs from a script he adapted with Ende, Rosemarie Fendel, and Marcello Coscia. Michael Ende himself appears in the film as a train passenger who is told the story and commits it to paper.

Beneath Momo's fairy-tale surface sits an argument against the economics of hurry, aimed at children but meant for the adults who brought them to see it.