“You play a good game, boy, but the game is over. Now you die.”
Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm is a lot of things. It’s incoherently plotted, poorly edited, the acting is wooden across the board and never improves, and it makes an almost defiantly little amount of sense. It’s also kind of a blast. Movies like this are B-movies, drive-in movies, at their purest. Phantasm takes itself seriously, but not too seriously; it doesn’t poke fun at itself, but it’s a good time nevertheless. Coscarelli is equally inspired by giallo films, supernatural horror, and slasher flicks, and as a result Phantasm is a strange brew of John Carpenter and Dario Argento. This is a horror classic – to an extent. It will never have the cultural cachet of A Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13th, but for diehard horror fans, this has been a staple since this first film came out in 1979.
Jody (Bill Thornbury) is back in town for the funeral of his friend Tommy. Tommy’s death was ruled a suicide, but we know the truth, having seen the first scene of the movie: he was murdered in the very cemetery in which he’s now being interred, and all we see of his killer is a face permanently etched into a scowl. This turns out to be the mortician, whom the characters dub the Tall Man (Angus Scrimm). Scrimm comes on real strong at the beginning, not letting his presence speak enough for itself. A far more effective introduction to the character comes after the funeral, when he lifts Tommy’s coffin by himself. This is all witnessed by Jody’s brother, Mike (A. Micheal Baldwin), who is spying on the funeral from the hedges.
So far this all makes sense, right? Here’s where things become very choppy, which is indicative of the film as a whole. Jody complains that Mike follows him around, which is true; Mike does follow his brother, spying on him really, but the film never really gives us a reason why. Mike sees Jody take a beautiful woman into the cemetery for sex (a ghastly, sleazy suggestion to which she seems very amenable), only to be attached by some cloaked homunculus from his espial bush.
This is also where it becomes glaringly apparent just how bad at acting this entire cast is. Scrimm fares all right, but Baldwin and Thornbury are just awful. Wooden and unconvincing in every line, every exclamation, every scream. Their only saving grace is that they seem to have good chemistry as brothers; Jody is at turns annoyed by and protective of Mike, and if nothing else, the actors’ body language convey this. There are a lot of things that Phantasm does wrong, and the acting is chief among them; it’s kind of a low-key miracle that this film is as watchable as it is.
And don’t get me wrong: Phantasm is kind of a blast. This is a movie that makes you want to yell at the screen, but it’s not all gory fun (it’s actually a mostly bloodless film). Coscarelli (Bubba Ho-Tep), who also wrote the script, conjures up some truly surreal, at times nightmarish imagery, which the film lets speak for itself. The practical effects are to be commended as well. There are no horrifyingly dated visual effects on display, which leaves room for gruesome, effective images such as a disembodied finger turning into some fanged monstrosity. The score, too, by Fred Myrow and Malcolm Seagrave, is well-done, although at first it seems like an imitation of John Carpenter’s iconic ’80s synth scores. There are passages of music that are surprisingly modern and ahead of their time, and the score genuinely helps propel the film forward.
Coscarelli is far more successful as a director than as a writer (although at 90 minutes, Phantasm should not feel as long as it does). The script is just a mess, and one gets the idea that the film just wants to move from set piece to set piece; in doing so, it sacrifices any semblance of human stakes. Characters are introduced as though we’re supposed to have known them for the whole film. Who are Sally and Susie? What is the antique shop that they own? They’re seemingly killed, but it’s later revealed that they, alongside other characters who we’ve never seen, have been rescued. Jody’s buddy Reggie (Reggie Bannister) is an ice cream man; at one point, Jody calls him and says that they need Reggie’s ice cream truck. Reggie shows up in full uniform, and is later seen driving it with the music on in the middle of the night. At times, Phantasm is truly insane.
Which explains why it doesn’t know how exactly to orchestrate its gonzo ending. It turns out that the Tall Man is an alien, or an immortal, or something otherworldly, compacting dead bodies and sending them to a different planet to act as slaves (shades of Stephen King’s Revival). But he can also teleport. But Jody and Mike are still able to trap him under rocks in a mine shaft (“Those rocks won’t hold him, not forever,” Mike laments, in case you were worried that Coscarelli wasn’t planning on a sequel). Then the true ending occurs, which makes negative sense. I won’t spoil it here because I’m still not certain I understand it. Suffice it to say that Phantasm at the last minute decides that it can operate on Nightmare on Elm Street logic, and hasn’t earned that at all.
I’m being hard on Phantasm, because, well, the movie has a lot of flaws. But I would still recommend it. This is a perfect movie to watch with a few friends, some beers, maybe your recreational drug of choice. This is not a movie that will make you laugh at the screen. It’s a move that will make you scratch your head. That was certainly my reaction. I’ve spent about a thousand words detailing just some of the problems with Phantasm, so why did I enjoy it so much?
Thursday, 10/1: Phantasm
Friday, 10/2: Frozen
Saturday, 10/3: Suspiria
Sunday, 10/4: Suspiria (2018)
Monday, 10/5: Emelie
Tuesday, 10/6: Castle Freak
Wednesday, 10/7: Session 9
Thursday, 10/8: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
Friday, 10/9: We Are Still Here
Saturday, 10/10: The Changeling
Sunday, 10/11: The Bad Seed
Monday, 10/12: Verotika
Tuesday, 10/13: The Legend of Hell House
Wednesday, 10/14: Lake Mungo
Thursday, 10/15: Puppetmaster
Friday, 10/16: Marrowbone
Saturday, 10/17: A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master
Sunday, 10/18: Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers
Monday, 10/19: Sweetheart
Tuesday, 10/20: Girl On the Third Floor
Wednesday, 10/21: Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon
Thursday, 10/22: Triangle
Friday, 10/23: Dog Soldiers
Saturday, 10/24: Noroi: The Curse
Sunday, 10/25: Train to Busan
Monday, 10/26: Tales From the Hood
Tuesday, 10/27: Mandy
Wednesday, 10/28: Sometimes They Come Back
Thursday, 10/29: Veronica
Friday, 10/30: The Wicker Man
Saturday, 10/31: Child’s Play
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