| release date | March 28 1979 |
| studio | MGM |
| director | Don Cascarelli |
| writer | Don Cascarelli |
| starring | Angus Scrimm, A. Michael Baldwin, Reggie Banister |
| rating | R |
| tagline | If this one doesn't scare you, you're already dead! |
| site | mgm.com/title_title.do?title_star=PHANT |
Phantasm was – and is – an italian, low-budget cultclassic back in 1979. To me however, it sometimes seems that Phantasm is one of those movies that gets overlooked and perhaps, even forgotten.
But let’s not rush into things and start of with the story of the movie.
The movie opens with Tommy, being killed by a girl he is making out with on the Morningside cemetary. The girl however turns out to be The Tall Man, the man that runs the morgue.
After Tommy’s funeral, Mike – the brother of one of Tommy’s best friends, Jodie, sees The Tall Man picking up Tommy’s coffin all by himself and putting it in the trunk of his car.
Later in the story, Mike gets attacked by a little brown creature of some sort, while he is hanging around the cemetary. He decides to investigate what’s going on and breaks into the morgue. There, he gets chased by The Tall Man, but manages to get away and even cut off a couple of The Tall Man’s fingers. Mike decides to take one of the fingers – that is still moving – home and show it to Jodie.
After seeing the moving finger, Jodie believes Mike’s story and together they go out to investigate.
Eventually they find out the truth about The Tall Man’s business, that is even stranger, bizarre and terrifying, then they could have ever expected, but the question is – is it reality ?
Not only is the story truly original and bizarre, the movie also is terrific. Alright, I will admitt that the acting is not really convincing at all times – with an exception for Angus Scrimm who plays The Tall Man really creepy -, but at the other hand I must also say, that it is offcourse impossible to act natural in such a strange story, so that kind of makes up for it.
Secondly, there’s the music. Phantasm is one of the few movies, that is worth watching, just for the music. In fact, I’m downloading the theme right now, because I just had to have it.
And offcourse, there is the atmosphere. The thin line between reality and dream is perfectly visualised and is really chilling and dark. The movie manages to stay creepy by leaving a lot to the imagination of the viewer. Normally, this is just a lame excuse for not having any blood in your movie, but in this case, it really, really works and it was done with a great eye for atmosphere and detail.
Alltogether, this makes a great, almost perfectly stylish movie, that you should really watch a couple of times, to let the atmosphere work in on you. Phantasm once again showed me, why I find italian movies so facinating.
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Posted this on my site http://www.horrormovieproject.net
Phantasm is a very creative horror movie that draws on original content from director Don Coscarelli. He had such huge ideas that it filled over three hours worth of footage. Much of which is now lost forever, but some has popped up in Director’s Cuts of the movie. The film sets it focus on a new antagonist, The Tall Man.
Angus Skrimm portrays the Tall Man, a ghoulish undertaker that is stealing bodies from the local cemetery and creating mindless dwarf zombies out of them. No one in the town knows about this and it is unclear how long it has been going on. However, a young boy witnesses the Tall Man and investigates him, much to his own horror.
This movie has a really good storyline to it and it is one of the main draws of the film. The movie also has some really sweet visuals that were obviously creepy in its day. The tools that the Tall Man utilizes are all creative and astounding. The mystery that surrounds the Tall Man creates an unknown horror around him that surrounds him the entire movie.
The movie is also accompanied by a great creepy soundtrack. It does wonders for the scenes and helps push the story along without sacrificing any of the scary elements. The movie has an unusual ending too, sort of with a twist. I couldn’t tell if the movie was ending or not.
All in all, I really liked this movie. I hadn’t watched it before and the dated effects didn’t even damage the viewing for me. It was a great movie with some really surprising twists. It made me want to watch the other movies in the series. I heard they are horrible, but whatever.
You play a good game boy, but the game is finished, now you die.
S!D
-The mansion used for the exterior shots of the mausoleum was also seen in the James Bond film A View to a Kill.
-The dwarfs were played by children.
-The copyright date shown during the closing credits of this film says MCMLXXVII (1977)