Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be checking out a horror movie from 1979. That movie is "Phantasm".
Now, I'm gonna be honest with you, guys, I don't really remember a whole lot about the "Phantasm" movies. I briefly heard about it a couple of years ago when I eventually stumbled upon a trailer for one of the movies on YouTube. I believe it may have been from the first movie, but I honestly couldn't tell you if that was the case or not. That said though, ever I since watched that trailer, I had a bit of a curiosity in checking out these movies for myself. And luckily for me, I get to cover all 5 of them for this series. So, you guys will have an idea as to what I'll be covering for the next couple of months or so.
Now as to I know about the "Phantasm" series, well, like I said, I really don't know very much about them. I know that they're all horror movies, and they're at least 5 of them in the series. And I also know about this old man that appears on the cover of most of these movies. Now perhaps it's just me, but the old man sorta reminds me of Igor from the "Persona" series. Don't ask me why, it just kinda sorta came into my mind. Who knows? Maybe the creator of the series, or someone over at ATLUS, took inspiration from this old man and eventually gave birth to Igor. I could be totally wrong on this, but that's just my own theory.
But setting that aside, I have almost no idea what to expect from these movies. I'm hoping that this first one will at least be really interesting, but the only way I'm gonna find out the answer to that is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Phantasm".
16 minutes later
Guys, so far, the one character who has been creeping me out is the old lady that Michael met. She's only been on-screen for about 2 minutes and I've been already creeped out by her appearance here. The old man, surprisingly, not yet, but that might change sooner, rather than later.
6 minutes later
So...the one who was making those weird growling noises was someone dressed up in complete darkness, almost like a druid, is the one who caused Michael to run away and scream like a little bitch. I was honestly expecting something bigger, but not really someone cloaked up from head to toe. I don't know why, guys, but it just seemed kinda silly to me to know that. I'm wondering how the hell it's making those growling noises, but I'm sure it'll probably be explained at some point, hopefully.
15 minutes later
O....K...I was wondering what the hell that round metal thing was that I've seen on the cover of most of these things. Apparently, once it's attached to you, it'll drill itself right into your fucking face while blood gushes out of it. I gotta say, that's kinda sorta cool, really! I wasn't really expecting that at all.
5 minutes later
OK, and now the cut-off finger of the old man has suddenly transformed into a puppet fly. A fly, I should mention, has now spawned onto Michael's head. I will say, guys, as goofy as these effects have been so far, I'm actually kinda digging how most of them have turned out, I'm actually rather impressed.
8 minutes later
So, upon discovering that there's no one driving the car that's after our heroes, Jody decides to shoot the front window's of the car in order to stop it. What fucking sense does that even make!? If you know there's someone that's not visibly driving, then why in the hell would you even attempt to shoot at somebody that's not even there to begin with? I'm not really seeing the logic there, guys. Oh, and the car actually crashed now...still doesn't answer my question, but I guess whatever works, worked, I guess.
1 minute later
OK, never mind, there *was* somebody driving the car. Apparently, it was one of those weird cloaked creatures that's been around throughout most of the movie. Oh...and it's Jody's dead brother. And he's bleeding mustard out of his mouth too, what do you know? I never would've guessed that, but I guess you learn something new everyday, don't ya?
13 minutes later
Well, guys, this movie teaches you a very valuable lesson. If you are forcibly locked in your own room, just get a hammer, some tape, and a shotgun bullet. Mix it together, and you can create a hammer bomb to get yourself out. Again, you *really* do learn something new everyday.
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Phantasm". Um...let me go ahead and shut the movie off now...OK. Wow, um...what to say about that ending...well, without going into spoiler territory here, there is a plot twist towards the end of the film, and I am very conflicted about it. I mean, I know what the movie was *trying* to say, but...I just don't know how I really feel about it. It's interesting, I will say that much. But in terms of whether or not it was actually a good plot twist is something I don't have an answer for. It just...good lord, I have no idea what to even say about it...
Well, let's move past the plot twist itself and actually try to focus on the writing here. And that's also gonna feel like a challenge here, because this movie's writing feels somewhat plotless and, at times, doesn't really make any sense. I kinda understood what was going on, at first, where we see Jody's brother being killed after banging a chick at a graveyard, to where it eventually turns out that he gets killed by our movie's villain, The Tall Man, who was somehow able to turn the killing into a suicide. It really doesn't make much sense, but I'm not gonna focus on that too much, let's just assume it was because of "fuck you, it's magic". So anyway, our main character, Michael, notices something odd about the casket that's being taken into the Tall Man's hearse, as he's able to handle the casket all by himself to put it in there. Which then gives Michael a quest to find out what the hell's been going on at this mausoleum, while also trying to avoid being killed by The Tall Man and whatever the hell else is going on there.
Now, I'm probably somewhat off on my summary for this plot because, again, this story doesn't really make sense at times. And even the movie really doesn't explain a whole lot, outside of one thing that involves these dwarfs that are also hanging around Morningside Cemetery, which is also where this mausoleum is located at. And it's not just the story here that feels odd, but I'm also going to include the characters. Specifically, I'm mostly gonna be talking about Jody and Michael. Because, both of them are bothers, who eventually get together after Michael was finally able to convince Jody that something creepy's going on at the mausoleum involving the Tall Man. But as characters, both of them feel kinda flat and one dimensional. The best I could get out of Michael is that he's worried that his brother is going to leave him one day, and he won't ever see him again. To which then he visits this old lady to get some guidance on what he should do, for which he gets reassured that his brother is not going to leave him. And throughout the movie, there is something kinda resembling conflict between the two characters, but I feel like it doesn't really go the extra mile. Well, at least up until the plot twist happens. Which, again, I'm gonna try to not talk about that ending, because I still have very conflicting feelings about it.
I guess the only other character that is even worth mentioning at all is our mortician, AKA The Tall Man. If I had to describe the Tall Man, I would say, in a way, that he kinda has the charisma of Freddy Kruger but also leaves a lot to be desired. And the reason why I say that is because the guy has no real backstory to him. Now, I don't know if that was intentional or not, or whether they're gonna save his backstory for any of the sequels down the road, but I am gonna say that if you're expecting to learn anything about the guy's background here, well...good fucking luck with that. Like I said, there's one thing that you do kinda know about him, and it's something related to the dwarfs that I mentioned a little while ago. However, I feel as if there's something else missing here in regards to the Tall Man. It *almost* works, but not quite. That said, there are two positives I can give this character. One of them is that, even though his backstory isn't really explored here, he definitely does give off a mysterious vibe which kinda gives the idea of you wanting to learn more about him. So on that end, it totally works for the character.
The other thing that makes this character stand out is the actor playing him, who I believe goes by the name of Angus Scrimm. This guy makes this character stand out in a rather positive way, and admittedly, while his character doesn't really have a whole lot of screen-time in the film, Angus looked like he was having a blast with this character. So I gotta give him a lot of props for making this character the stand out of the entire film, even if he was rather under-utilized here. And as for the rest of the acting, it's just OK. None of it is great, mind you, and some of the acting from both Michael and Jody feel kinda one-notish at times. But for the most part, the acting here is just fine. Again, none of it is great, but it's certainly doesn't lean anywhere near to being the worst acting I have ever heard from a horror movie.
Special effects though, are definitely a mixed bag here. The best effect, I'm gonna start with, has to go to the scene where the metal sphere pierces this guy's face and is bleeding out through one of the holes of the sphere in which he got stabbed from. It is, by far, the best effect in this entire movie. The rest of the practical effects though, definitely lean into a mixed bag territory. The two that are gonna stand out to you the most are the fly monster, which is basically just a sorta cheap-looking puppet. And the other has to be anytime whenever someone is bleeding yellow. Don't ask me why they bleed yellow, they just do. Anyway, there's a moment in the film where Michael is first trying to run away from the Tall Man, and he's able to cut off one of the Tall Man's fingers and put it in a small wooden box. And when Michael shows Jody the finger in the box, you can also see the yellow blood that's surrounding the finger, except it just looks like they used mustard to disguise it as blood. It looks really cheap, however, if I have to be honest, I actually find both this, and the fly puppet, really charming to look at. Now perhaps maybe it's just because I really like the standards of how low budget horror movies are able to handle most of their practical effects, and I find this sort of thing to be rather endearing to look at. So, it's just something that you have to take for what it's worth, but I will say that I do rather like the cheap-looking special effects for this movie, even if they're not really that good.
Camerawork here is really good. The lighting here is lit rather well, especially in the darkly-lit areas, because they were able to have a good balance on how to balance both the light and the dark areas at the same time. Sound-mix is mixed rather well. The score here is great. Not only does it use original synth music, but it's also another one of those horror movies that knows *when* to use music and when to be silent. And the silent moments are fantastic. Which is something that is sorely lacking in a lot of modern horror movies within the last decade or so, possibly more than that. Either way, the score here is great, and is definitely one of the biggest positives this movie has to offer.
But ultimately, guys, when all is said and done, can I recommend "Phantasm"? Kind of, yes. I say this, as long as you're willing to shut your brain off and immerse yourself within this movie's world. Because I feel like if you're able to do that, and not think about this movie's somewhat convoluted story, then what you have is a rather fascinating horror movie. And I can definitely see why people would view this thing as a cult classic. Granted, I'm not sure if it's something that I would immerse myself with personally, but I will say that the first film was rather interesting, to say the least. And it does give me some hope that the sequels will improve on this in some way. I'm not sure if they will or not, but I'll just have to wait and see for myself, now won't we? But anyway, guys, I can probably recommend this movie to you guys, if just for a single viewing experience. And as for me, I think I'm gonna go and rewatch another horror movie of sorts. Well, even though it hasn't been that long ago since I reviewed it for this series, I'm probably gonna go and rewatch "Christine" again. I remember really enjoying myself with that movie, so I'm gonna go and rewatch that again, just to immerse myself with this time of year, being it Halloween season and all.
Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
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