Editorials
‘Wishcraft’ Was Late to the Teen Slasher Revival But Still Offers a Clever Premise [Hidden Gems]
Wishploitation horror is as scanty as it is distinct. Leprechaun and Wishmaster, being the most prominent examples in this meager subgenre, bear wish-granters with sinister intentions. Other similar movies are largely inspired by W.W. Jacobs’ “The Monkey’s Paw.” From Deathdream to Wish Upon, this short story gets a lot of mileage. Then we have Richard Wenk‘s Wishcraft, perhaps the most unique adaptation of the bunch. While the eponymous, clenched mitt is absent, the threat of “be careful what you wish for” remains intact.
The short but sweet teen slasher revival triggered by Scream had practically come to an end by 2002. Bringing up the rear was Wishcraft, a movie people don’t remember much less know of. It yields all the trappings of its predecessors — namely a high school setting and a disguised killer — while still offering an element that made it stand out. This, of course, being the underplot of supernatural wish fulfillment.
All the standard movie cliques are present and accounted for at Martin Van Buren High School. As tension brews between the jocks and the goths, brainy Brett (Michael Weston, Cherry Falls) and his best friend Howie (A. J. Buckley, The Forsaken) people-watch from the sidelines. They’re coasting through their senior year still without a group to call their own. Howie is looking to be more social, whereas Brett nurses an unrequited crush on classmate Samantha (Alexandra Holden, Drop Dead Gorgeous). She’s friendly with Brett, but it’s clear she sees him as nothing more than a tutor. That is, until Brett receives an anonymously gifted totem with instructions stating “it will grant its owner three wishes.” At a curio shop, the owner identifies the object as a bull pizzle, or, as the same man clarifies ever so bluntly—a centuries-old, mummified “bull dick.” Although technically not a monkey’s paw, it works all the same.
Brett immediately wishes for Samantha to ask him to the spring dance. To his and Howie’s amazement, she invites him the next day. As confused as Brett is, imagine how Samantha’s current boyfriend Cody (Hunter Ridley, Bring It On) must feel. The connection is brief, which only leads to Brett reiterating the same wish—this time, he emphasizes that things last “forever.” In the meantime, someone wearing a grotesque mask and a black cloak is picking off Brett’s classmates one by one. Does this string of gruesome murders have anything to do with the mystic pizzle? All signs point to “yes.”
Now, it just wouldn’t be a slasher without kills, would it? And, on the whole, Wishcraft does not disappoint. The villain gets more creative as the movie continues. We’ve got basic butchery (decapitations and stabbings) along with a few convoluted sequences involving axes, a bowling ball, and swordplay. Any chance at authentic tension is usually undercut by feeble dialogue or humor. Still, the deaths inch towards clever. The most deserving is one character’s tortuous suspension from a traffic light that defies logic. And when it comes time to remove the mask, the killer’s identity is a pleasant surprise. Watch out for that bracing monologue doubling as a ludicrous motive.
The script is where the movie fizzles; Wishcraft struggles with story lines competing rather than cooperating. By that, a sizable chunk of the film is dedicated to Brett and Samantha’s relationship, one that often feels creepy for reasons made known later. Streamlining that plot, emphasizing the killer’s scenes, and removing Howie’s irritating side antics would have not only made for a more acceptable runtime, but also a better movie. Larry Katz’s writing never reaches the heights of his contemporaries back then. In spite of that, the main characters here are singular and amusing so long as you’re all right with the stock they come from.
Wishcraft sits on a gimmick that’s ready-made for outward chaos. The consequences Brett faces from using the totem are instead tame and concern morals. Ignoring the fact that Brett never once considers wishing away the serial killer, it’s almost endearing as to how juvenile his actual wishes are. However, his desire for Samantha to be his girlfriend incidentally robs the character of her power. This makes many of their scenes together uncomfortable to watch knowing Samantha has no control over her actions. Howie, of all the characters, acts as the moral compass. He reminds his best friend of what he’s done to Samantha, which then urges Brett to confess and give her a chance to make a conscious choice. It’s a small patch on a worrisome design.
Wishcraft comfortably fits right in with the likes of Urban Legend and Valentine, two mainstream slashers from the same era that have each found sizable cult followings. Above-average production values and a tendency towards practical effects work in the movie’s favor. Had the cast included more familiar faces — with the exceptions of Meat Loaf and Zelda Rubinstein, both of whom are underutilized — the film might have been guaranteed more attention. As it stands, Wishcraft doesn’t entirely improve on a classic story. Richard Wenk’s movie is a charmed paste-up of good, if not well-worn, ideas. It’s a shame this one didn’t get a chance at the big screen, but, as we all know with hidden gems, we can only wish they find a wider audience one day.
With there being an overlap between wrestling fans and horror fans, it only made sense for WWE Studios to produce See No Evil. And much like The Rock’s Walking Tall and John Cena’s The Marine, this 2006 slasher was designed to jumpstart a popular wrestler’s crossover career; superstar Glenn “Kane” Jacobs stepped out of the ring and into a run-down hotel packed with easy prey. Director Gregory Dark and writer Dan Madigan delivered what the WWE had hoped to be the beginning of “a villain franchise in the vein of Jason, Freddy and Pinhead.” In hindsight, See No Evil and its unpunctual sequel failed to live up to expectations. Regardless of Jacob Goodnight’s inability to reach the heights of horror’s greatest icons, his films are not without their simple slasher pleasures.
See No Evil (previously titled Goodnight and Eye Scream Man) was a last gasp for a dying trend. After all, the Hollywood resurgence of big-screen slashers was on the decline by the mid-2000s. Even so, that first Jacob Goodnight offering is well aware of its genre surroundings: the squalid setting channels the many torturous playgrounds found in the Saw series and other adjacent splatter pics. Also, Gregory Dark’s first major feature — after mainly delivering erotic thrillers and music videos — borrows the mustardy, filthy and sweaty appearance of Platinum Dunes’ then-current horror output. So, visually speaking, See No Evil fits in quite well with its contemporaries.
Despite its mere setup — young offenders are picked off one by one as they clean up an old hotel — See No Evil is more ambitious than anticipated. Jacob Goodnight is, more or less, another unstoppable killing machine whose traumatic childhood drives him to torment and murder, but there is a process to his mayhem. In a sense, a purpose. Every new number in Goodnight’s body count is part of a survival ritual with no end in sight. A prior and poorly mended cranial injury, courtesy of Steven Vidler’s character, also influences the antagonist’s brutal streak. As with a lot of other films where a killer’s crimes are religious in nature, Goodnight is viscerally concerned with the act of sin and its meaning. And that signature of plucking out victims’ eyes is his way of protecting his soul.
Image: The cast of See No Evil enters the Blackwell Hotel.
Survival is on the mind of just about every character in See No Evil, even before they are thrown into a life-or-death situation. Goodnight is processing his inhumane upbringing in the only way he can, whereas many of his latest victims have committed various crimes in order to get by in life. The details of these offenses, ranging from petty to severe, can be found in the film’s novelization. This more thorough media tie-in, also penned by Madigan, clarified the rap sheets of Christine (Christina Vidal), Kira (Samantha Noble), Michael (Luke Pegler) and their fellow delinquents. Readers are presented a grim history for most everyone, including Vidler’s character, Officer Frank Williams, who lost both an arm and a partner during his first encounter with the God’s Hand Killer all those years ago. The younger cast is most concerned with their immediate wellbeing, but Williams struggles to make peace with past regrets and mistakes.
While the first See No Evil film makes a beeline for its ending, the literary counterpart takes time to flesh out the main characters and expound on scenes (crucial or otherwise). The task requires nearly a third of the book before the inmates and their supervisors even reach the Blackwell Hotel. Yet once they are inside the death trap, the author continues to profile the fodder. Foremost is Christine and Kira’s lock-up romance born out of loyalty and a mutual desire for security against their enemies behind bars. And unlike in the film, their sapphic relationship is confirmed. Meanwhile, Michael’s misogyny and bigotry are unmistakable in the novelization; his racial tension with the story’s one Black character, Tye (Michael J. Pagan), was omitted from the film along with the repeated sexual exploitation of Kira. These written depictions make their on-screen parallels appear relatively upright. That being said, by making certain characters so prickly and repulsive in the novelization, their rare heroic moments have more of an impact.
Madigan’s book offers greater insight into Goodnight’s disturbed mind and harrowing early years. As a boy, his mother regularly doled out barbaric punishments, including pouring boiling water onto his “dangling bits” if he ever “sinned.” The routine maltreatment in which Goodnight endured makes him somewhat sympathetic in the novelization. Also missing from the film is an entire character: a back-alley doctor named Miles Bennell. It was he who patched up Goodnight after Williams’ desperate but well-aimed bullet made contact in the story’s introduction. Over time, this drunkard’s sloppy surgery led to the purulent, maggot-infested head wound that, undoubtedly, impaired the hulking villain’s cognitive functions and fueled his violent delusions.
Image: Dan Madigan’s novelization for See No Evil.
An additional and underlying evil in the novelization, the Blackwell’s original owner, is revealed through random flashbacks. The author described the hotel’s namesake, Langley Blackwell, as a deviant who took sick pleasure in defiling others (personally or vicariously). His vile deeds left a dark stain on the Blackwell, which makes it a perfect home for someone like Jacob Goodnight. This notion is not so apparent in the film, and the tie-in adaptation says it in a roundabout way, but the building is haunted by its past. While literal ghosts do not roam these corridors, Blackwell’s lingering depravity courses through every square inch of this ill-reputed establishment and influences those who stay too long.
The selling point of See No Evil back then was undeniably Kane. However, fans might have been disappointed to see the wrestler in a lurking and taciturn role. The focus on unpleasant, paper-thin “teenagers” probably did not help opinions, either. Nevertheless, the first film is a watchable and, at times, well-made straggler found in the first slasher revival’s death throes. A modest budget made the decent production values possible, and the director’s history with music videos allowed the film a shred of style. For meatier characterization and a harder demonstration of the story’s dog-eat-dog theme, though, the novelization is worth seeking out.
Jen and Sylvia Soska, collectively The Soska Sisters, were put in charge of 2014’s See No Evil 2. This direct continuation arrived just in time for Halloween, which is fitting considering its obvious inspiration. In place of the nearly deserted hospital in Halloween II is an unlucky morgue receiving all the bodies from the Blackwell massacre. Familiar face Danielle Harris played the ostensible final girl, a coroner whose surprise birthday party is crashed by the resurrected God’s Hand Killer. In an effort to deliver uncomplicated thrills, the Soskas toned down the previous film’s heavy mythos and religious trauma, as well as threw in characters worth rooting for. This sequel, while more straightforward than innovative, pulls no punches and even goes out on a dark note.
The chances of seeing another See No Evil with Kane attached are low, especially now with Glenn Jacobs focusing on a political career. Yet there is no telling if Jacob Goodnight is actually gone, or if he is just playing dead.
Image: Katharine Isabelle and Lee Majdouba’s characters don’t notice Kane’s Jacob Goodnight character is behind them in See No Evil 2.
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