Ok you horror fans, just tell me you wouldn't have killed to have been at the 'Bloor Cinema' in Toronto to experience this night. Damn, they sound like they had some fun with this flick. Too bad the rest of us don't get a theatrical showing...
Harry...I don't have much time to write this. They're after me. The balls. BIG SILVER BALLS...The Thin Man's balls. For I was one of the few survivors left alive after having witnessed the world premiere of...(dramatic pause)
PHANTASM IV: oblIVion!
The coolest place in the world Tuesday night wasn't L.A., it wasn't New York, it wasn't Tokyo. It was the Bloor Cinema in Toronto, Canada where the FANT/ASIA Film Festival presented the world premiere of the latest (and probably last) film in one of the most loved horror franchises in the world, the Phantasm series. But what made this moment even cooler was the presence of the two men most responsible for Phantasm's success - director Don Coscarelli and, yes, The Tall Man himself, Angus Scrimm!
Before the movie started, Julian Grant, the organizer of the festival and a high-quality B-movie director in his own right (Airbag with Steve Guttenberg, Elektra with Shannon Tweed, Creep - an incredibly, well, creepy, surrealist horror short; go look for it), lovingly presented Don and Mr. Scrimm (I can't call him just 'Angus') to the adoring crowd. Both men introduced themselves, thanked everyone for coming and briefly introduced the film before letting the curtain fall and the darkness pounce! So what about the movie? Read on...quickly!
The Plot: In a word: incomprehensible. It picks up pretty much where Phantasm III left off (I think, it's been three years since I watched it), with grown-up orphan Michael driving the hearse off into the desert, one of the murderous orbs implanted in his head. Reggie, released by The Tall Man, follows. The rest of the film follows Reggie as he makes his way towards the Funeral Mountains (filmed in Death Valley) for a final confrontaion with The Thin Man and his supposedly dead brother Jody (his consciousness now sealed up in one of the silver balls). I won't include too many spoilers but I will say that the origin of the Tall Man is revealed (he was a normal human once!) and a kind of conclusion is reached, although the possibility of another sequel is there.
How does it stack up to the rest of the series?: Well, the killer Jawas (as Coscarelli calls them) make a few appearances and we get to see their faces (uggh!). Reggie doesn't get laid but his attempts make for the most gruesome and funniest moment in the movie. Reggie also gets the movie's best lines: (speaking to a beautiful woman he's rescued from a car crash in the desert) "Honey, I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but believe me, he (The Tall Man) is going down!"
But Phantasm IV suffers from 1) a weak script and 2) no budget. After the movie, Coscarelli and Scrimm answered the audience's questions, and Coscarelli said that raising financing for the film was difficult. Eventually, he ended up with less than a million dollars to work with. Not that you need ILM working on your movie, but God, for a horror movie especially you need to put that money up on the screen! The flying balls, such a kick-ass prop in the previous few films, make only brief appearances here, with virtually no brain-gouging to speak of. And that script! I had so little clue about what was going on, it wasn't funny. Everyone in the audience was rooting for this film but it just did not deliver! Okay, but The Tall Man kicked ass, right?: The Tall Man is still the Tall Man. Scrimm's presence is imposing but he's in his 70s now and looks it. Still, he's one mean-looking son of a bitch up on screen, and he can still make that one word - "Boooooyyyyyyy!" - sound really intimidating. Don't expect another Phantasm, although Don was obviously buoyed by the positive crowd reaction?
The acting: Has this ever been a consideration? Don't start picking apart the series' painfully overwrought acting style now.
In conclusion: A rather sad, disappointing and confusing conclusion to a series which was never very high on logic.
Interesting facts: Coscarelli and Mr. Scrimm answered questions after the showing, like I said, and they were both gracious and polite, especially Mr. Scrimm, who (he revealed) is not so tall after all. (He was 6' 4", but with age, he is now 6' 1 1/2"!)
Coscarelli shot multiple endings and additional footage during the making of the original Phantasm which he had forgotten about. When the footage was returned to him and the possibility of a fourth movie presented itself, he decided to use some of that footage. So quite a bit of Phantasm IV consists of flashbacks to the original movie, which works for a while, but seems kind of cheap by the end. Although one sequence (**spoiler alert**) is pretty stunning: It shows Reggie and Michael hanging The Tall Man and Michael, unable to sleep, cutting him down when the still alive Tall Man tells him he'll leave the world alone if he cuts him down. Spook stuff!
The direction of the new film was influenced by fan reactions to the first three. Fans complained of too many characters and too much humour in the last movie, so Coscarelli pared the cast down (drastically) in Phantasm IV and made it a far more serious film. Too bad. A bit of leavening humour would have come as a relief at some point.
Angus Scrimm is a gracious, talented, generous man who genuinely loves meeting fans and is enthusiastic about his job. Did you know he once played Abraham Lincoln in a short film for the Encyclopedia Britannica? Well, now you know.
A new VHS edition of the original Phantasm is being released next month with 4 minutes of additional footage.
Overall: Expect Phantasm IV to bypass theatres altogether. Video is a more likely fate for this film. See it if you're a hardcore Phantasm nut but go back to the original for inspiration.
And now they're coming. THE BALLS! THE SILVER BALLS! ARGGGGH! SQUISH!
CK Dexter Haven
And now for Jean Cocteau's review. This fella had a lot of fun with the movie, and ya know, if you're with the right audience in the right theater, you would love it. I'd loved to have been up there at the screening. For one, we won't see it on screens down here, instead will see it on the boob tube. Shucks, that taint no fun at all...
I had the pleasure of watching Phantasm 4 last evening at it's Premier at the Fantasia Festival in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Angus Scrimm and the Director were there (forgive me his name escapes me) There was an interesting question and answer period after.
I am probabally not a very good person to review this movie as I am not a die hard phantasm fan (though there were a lot in the crowd). However It was GREAT. It cleared up a lot of questions you may have had from the earlier movies. It was not as campy as the third (the icecream man does not disappoint) For a small budget it was fantastic. Not very gory but visually excellent. My partner said it was a little confusing (of course I got it all)
The use a lot of unused footage from Phantasm 1 and there is a lot of jumping back and forth. Looks like the last in the franchise. Phantasm 1 is being rereleased on video next month with 4 extra minutes of footage not in either movie (1 or 4) (MGM I think)
All in all loved the movie. Loved being at the premier and anxiously awaiting Dentist 2 and Vampires on Sunday. Can't believe all these cool movies premiering in my own back yard.
Love aint it cool news and I tell everyone to check it out ( after gasping in disbelief that they dont already know! )
Jean Cocteau
