Phantasm (1979) *

This is an old horror film, considered a classic, that I had never gotten around to watching. It wasn't director Don Coscarelli's first project, but it's the one that launched his career, and he is still most famous for his “Phantasm” franchise. Coscarelli made this, the first in the series, for only around $300,000. That would be quite a bargain if the movie were even marginally good.

The story concerns a couple of brothers, Jody and Mike, who discover odd goings-on at the local funeral home. The exceptionally-tall undertaker (known in the Phantasm movies as The Tall Man) is taking dead bodies and shrinking them into 3-foot-tall slaves. He keeps some of them around to serve him, and others he ships off through a dimensional portal for unspecified purposes. To help with his dirty work, he has a silver pool ball that flies around and can drill into people's heads.

It all sounds like it could be good. Throw in some titties and some fake blood, and you've got a movie! Unfortunately, the thing is a complete mess. I haven't seen such an aggressively nonsensical movie since “Manos: The Hands of Fate.” I have no problem with the cheap special effects or the weirdness, but a movie should, at a minimum, follow some sort of narrative with at least internal logic. “Phantasm” just jumps from scene to scene, sometimes abandoning entire storylines. The worst part is the “It was all a dream --- or was it?!” ending.

I've read a few articles on the making of “Phantasm,” and it sounds like Coscarelli had no idea where he was going with it. The script was constantly re-written during filming, and he filmed several different endings. The original cut ran for around 3 hours, which Coscarelli was forced to cut to the released movie's 90 minutes. I'm thinking he cut the movie in half and then submitted the wrong half.

1 star out of 5