US | 1979 | Directed by Don Coscarelli
Logline: A teenage boy, with his older brother and buddy, face off against a mysterious and dangerous grave-robber.
A phantasm is an apparition, a ghostly vision, or spectre. It’s also a creation of the imagination, a fantasy. Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm (released as The Never Dead down under) is all that and more. It melds science fiction, mystery and horror into a feverish hybrid. No other movie is like Phantasm. It exists in its own fantastical realm, equally flawed and ingenious, dark cosmic trash.
Young teenager Mike (Michael Baldwin) and his twentysomething brother Jody (Bill Thornbury) are living together as recent orphans. Tommy, buddy of Jody’s, has died in seemingly mysterious circumstances and Mike spies on Jody acting as a pallbearer at the funeral in Morningside Cemetery. Through his binoculars Mike notices The Tall Man (Angus Scrimm) lifting the coffin by himself and heaving it into the hearse. It’s definitely a “wtf!” moment.
Mike takes matters into his own hands and investigates further, seeing hooded dwarfs darting behind tombstones. Inside the cemetery mausoleum Mike witnesses extreme violent weirdness. He finally convinces his brother, and his brother’s mate Reggie (Reggie Bannister), to try and get to the bottom of it, and the three plunge headlong deep into supernatural trouble.
Don Coscarelli achieved a remarkable feat with Phantasm. At 24-years-old not only did he write and direct the feature, he also shot and edited the movie. His mother Kate was production designer, costume designer and make-up (under different pseudonyms), whilst his father co-produced alongside special effects whizz Paul Pepperman. Other key members of the crew doubled in various capacities, very much a skeleton crew-cum family affair, whilst special nod must go to the psychotronic synth score from Fred Myrow and Malcolm Seagrove.
The movie was made for around $US300k. It made millions. Coscarelli went on to make the Tanya Roberts sword and sandal “gem” The Beastmaster, before returning ten years later for the first of several Phantasm sequels, each with varying budgets and box office success. Phantasm is so rich in wacky horror ideas and so curiously effective with its atmosphere and vibe that Coscarelli can rest on its laurels for decades to come.
The acting is bad news, seriously bad. The dialogue is no better. But the screenplay twists and turns like a high fever bad dream, riddled with bizarre moments, my favourite sees Mike being chased by The Tall Man through the funeral home and managing to slam a heavy door just before the ghoulish suited man grabs him. Mike leans back catching his breath. There is a flapping sound and the camera pans slowly to the right to reveal The Tall Man’s hand trapped between door and the frame, his fingers flapping. Mike uses his knife and slices off several of the fingers. The Tall Man howls from behind the door. Sickly yellow blood spurts out and the fingers continue to wriggle on the floor. Mike picks up one of them and pops it into his breast pocket, and takes off. As you do!
Watching the movie again to celebrate its fortieth birthday, I’m struck by how all the elements of the movie are like a checklist for a mischievous adolescent boy (or an adult who still acts like one), while its sheer absurdity threatens to consume the entire movie. Like some strange alien demon teddy bear, so dodgy and wrong, but so damn endearing. Even the hokey-as-all-hell “It’s all a dream” cliché gets a solid workout … and works.
Considering the movie’s low budget, and the inherent restraints this imposed on the production (filming took a year), Phantasm transcends its limitations. Okay, so silly insect effects aside, atrocious acting aside, and plot holes big enough for an ice-cream truck to drive through, it’s deep trash parading as high art, or perhaps its high art sleeping in the gutter, either way Phantasm rocks and rolls and swerves and spurts! Fear the Silver Sphere!