PHANTASM: RAVAGER (2016)

[This review contains spoilers for Phantasm: Ravager.]

No horror fan has ever had to endure such a long wait between sequels as Phantasm phans. Making it harder is that we can’t liken Phantasm to a more traditional horror series like Friday the 13th or A Nightmare on Elm Street. The simplicity of those films, though they vary in quality, don’t create the same kind of angst in between entries. Mini-arcs, one-offs, ret-cons, or now, reboots, comprise those series. Neither series told one over-arcing story, or featured the same creative team or repertoire of actors. And none of them made their fanbase wait eighteen years for the concluding entry.

Phantasm did.

Begun in 1979 as just a creepy, low budget horror tale set against the night, which found the Pearson brothers and their family friend, Reggie, squaring off against an evil from — another dimension? planet? world? time? existence? — their nightmares, Phantasm was never meant to become what it became. And no one seemed more surprised by that than its creator, Don Coscarelli (Bubba Ho-Tep; John Dies at the End).

The Phantasm series would continue down a strange path, its trajectory constantly changing. Phantasm II, the only sequel to be funded and released by a major studio, jettisoned the more dreamlike aspects of the series that would have confused mainstream audiences. Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead was shot independently, which revisited those dreamlike aspects with a vengeance. Phantasm IV: Oblivion was shot with the same mindset, but with a twist: a large portion of the film was assembled using cut footage from the very first Phantasm, leaving its modern-day characters to look back on their memories that didn’t jive with their realities. It was a beautiful and frustrating experiment that further clouded the waters of the Phantasm mythos, leaving it all in the hands of the phan to determine what really happened.

Eighteen years later, after a couple false starts, rumored projects, nearly a New Line Cinema-funded remake-trilogy of the series, and a lot of post-trailer announcement dead air, Phantasm: Ravager is here — for better or worse.

Picking up where Oblivion left off (kind of), Ravager finds Reggie (Reggie Bannister) wandering the desert, his ice cream suit bloodied and torn from an unseen battle, looking for his ‘Cuda, or his friend Mike (A. Michael Baldwin), or a friendly face. But it also finds him in a nursing home, sat in a wheelchair, being comforted by Mike, who is telling him that he’s been diagnosed with dementia — that these “stories” about The Tall Man are, this time, Reggie’s delusions. And there’s yet another Reggie wandering his own desert, in his usual flannel and jeans garb. There are multiple Reggies, multiple Mikes. What is happening? How is this possible?

Because much of this footage had been originally shot as the basis for webisodes called Reggie’s Tales over the course of 6-7 years, which were then co-opted by Ravager. (If you're wondering why Coscarelli didn't serve as director on Ravager, it's because these webisodes were all directed by special effects guru David Hartman, which weren't originally intended to be folded into a feature sequel.)

In what was promised as the concluding chapter that would answer nearly all the questions posed by the series, Ravager is strangely experimental — to the point where the physical manifestation of alternate dimensions colliding with each other, which up to this point in the series had been merely theoretical, feels almost as if it were manufactured to purposely conjure confusion. The Phantasm series has always been willing to screw with its audience, leaving them to wonder what was real and what wasn’t, and so far, it was through the films’ construction where that confusion felt earned and all part of the plan. But Ravager feels intent on flat-out mystifying its audience, injecting a sort of series ret-con that never feels like it were destined, but more like a response to the slow, organic change that has carried through the entire Phantasm series so far — the evolution of Reggie from supporting character to lead hero. Ravager suggests that the series has always been about Reggie, and though Reggie Bannister is a wonderful human being, and his on-screen Reggie is the kind of loyal, loving, guitar-strumming hippy friend we all wish we could have, the series was never about him. It was about the strange link between Mike Pearson and The Tall Man. How was it that this thirteen-year-old kid (at first) had the power and the knowledge to best an evil being from another world? And what did The Tall Man mean when he said he and Mike “have things to do” during Oblivion? Indeed, every entry of the Phantasm series reinforced the idea that there existed a special link between Mike and The Tall Man. Ravager, except for a single line during a confrontation between Reggie and the infamous tall boogey-alien, seems to have forgotten all that. Mike, though Baldwin is featured somewhat prominently, comes off as an afterthought — almost like a plot hole that Coscarelli and new director Hartman had to contend with in order to satisfy “the Reggie story.” And that, more than anything else about Ravager, feels very wrong.

Like all the other films in the series, Ravager is very ambitious. With eyes larger than its budget, Ravager wants to be the be-all, end-all flashbang ending to the series that the phans have been clamoring for since 1998 (and which seems to have borrowed elements from Pulp Fiction co-writer Roger Avary’s unproduced Phantasm’s End script). The problem is whatever budget Coscarelli and co. had couldn’t support that ambitious vision. From a production standpoint, Ravager feels instantly at odds with the series; its obvious digital shoot doesn’t mesh with the previous shot-on-film predecessors, including the lushly photographed Oblivion. None of the CGI, which is relied on far too often, looks convincing, and the sequences showing widespread hell-like destruction across entire cities look straight out of a video game. (By comparison, the original film’s technique of literally throwing silver sphere Christmas ornaments down a mausoleum hallway, or hanging them from fishing line, look a damn sight better. It’s ironic that Coscarelli and J.J. Abrams embarked on a two-year journey to restore Phantasm and digitally erase all the “mistakes” and “tricks” with the special effects that bothered Coscarelli for years — including that fishing line — but apparently he’s totally fine with the effects in Ravager.)

The phan in you will want to ignore all this; the love you have for the series will want you to push it all aside and say, “they’re really going for it, aren’t they? Good for them!” But the phan in you also recognizes that, after eighteen years, you deserved better. You deserved something with a look beyond that of a Sy-Fy Channel original, or a production from The Asylum. You deserved Coscarelli being in the trenches with his audience and himself helming the last entry of the series he created, and for which he oversaw every entry. But really, what you deserved was Coscarelli deciding, “if we can’t do this right, we’re not going to do it at all.”

The Phantasm series has always posed a lot of questions, but Ravager poses the wrong ones. Why reduce The Tall Man’s role from lead horror villain to a quasi-philosophical bargainer whom none of our protagonists seem especially fearful of confronting, relegating his role to man who lays in a bed or stands around? (He doesn’t even backhand anyone across the room! That’s, like, his signature move!) Why give this entry’s destruction of The Tall Man to an inconsequential character who was never involved in the series until this entry, robbing Mike and Reggie of their own final confrontation? Why bother bringing back Bill Thornbury (the series’ Jody Pearson), Kat Lester (Phantasm‘s Lady in Lavender) and Gloria Lynne Henry (Phantasm III’s beloved Rocky) for…that? (And why rob the phans of an on-screen reunion of Rocky and Reggie, being they spent all of Phantasm III together? They're in the same car but never share the same shot once. I mean, what the fuck!) And perhaps the most concerning of all, why has Coscarelli forgotten that Mike Pearson is the main character — the trigger around which the entire series has been constructed?

But it’s not all doom and gloom, however. There are sequences and moments in Ravager that really work. Reggie’s very first non-voiceover line of dialogue will have you laughing out loud, and his ongoing struggle to get laid concludes in the most appropriate way. The bond between our characters, especially Reggie and Mike, is as strong as ever. And how could it not be? They’ve been real-life family since before the first frame of the first Phantasm was ever shot. That final “real world” sequence between Reggie, Mike, and Jody — even though it feels at odds with the overall series story — still works on an emotional level, because we have been with these characters for forty years; we’ve grown older just as they’ve gown older, but throughout this time, we never lost touch with them, and we tagged along during their night-time adventures in Morningside, or Perigord, or Holtsville, or Death Valley.

In keeping with that longevity, seeing Angus Scrimm embody The Tall Man one last time (it’s fitting that his swan song was a return to the role which has earned him infinite infamy) is a delight, especially being that he may be older (although the film digitally de-ages him), but he hasn’t lost his edge, or his grasp on the character. Composer Christopher L. Stone has created the best musical score of the series since the first film, which somehow doesn’t sound cheap, but rather large, flourishing, and wide reaching. Hartman stages some moments of genuine eeriness as well as some exciting sequences, most of them having to do with high-speed chases on desert highways between the series’ beloved ‘Cuda and a swath of brain-drilling silver spheres. The scene set in the hospital that sees the “real” world and the possible dream world colliding with each other, with Mike tossing Reggie a gun to aerate the droves of gravers attacking him — while also fleeing reality — was beautifully done. And the ending — not the “real” ending, but the one that, oddly, seems more optimistic — was strikingly poetic, doing a fine job summarizing what the series has always been about: brotherhood, loyalty, and defiance in the face of death.

Was Phantasm: Ravager worth the wait? That’s a hard question to ask, and an even harder one to answer. Because at this point, it’s the phans who own the Phantasm series and no one else — not mainstream audiences, not critics, and not the casual horror crowd. Everything about the series is beyond those demographics’ criticisms. It’s up to the individual phan to determine whether Ravager was a fitting end to the long-running series, or a blown opportunity for the catharsis that Oblivion had the decency to temporarily provide, even within its fog of ambiguity. For this particular phan, eighteen years is a hell of a long wait to end up with something like Phantasm: Ravager.

JOHN DIES AT THE END

REVIEW: PHANTASM EXHUMED

Perhaps it all began with William Schoell's The Nightmare Never Ends: The Official History of Freddy Krueger and the Nightmare on Elm Street Films, the first modern book to tackle a series in its entirety (at least, at that time) film by film. A loving ode and heavily researched retrospective on a fantastical series, it would be one of many books to come down the pike that celebrated, analyzed, and perhaps even poked fun at the various entries that made up the film franchise being discussed. Following in Schoell's footsteps were Fangoria writer Bill Warren's The Evil Dead Companion, Stefan Jaworzyn's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Companion, Peter Bracke's amazing piece of printed art, Crystal Lake Memories: A Complete History of Friday the 13th, and 2006's quietly released The Hellraiser Films and Their Legacy by Paul Kane. With Halloween: The Complete History coming (eventually) from author Justin Beahm, it would seem we've now got at least one series retrospective celebration on every one of our beloved horror movie villains*. That is, until Dustin McNeil came along, knowing that there was still one villainous madman out there who had yet to have his exploits examined with as much detail and devotion - one madman with perhaps the most devious and despicable plan for humanity of all those that came before and after him.

Said madman was also the tallest.

With the still-warm release of Phantasm Exhumed, author McNeil has done the Phantasm phamily and phans more than a service with his excruciatingly researched book. Finally, this series that never had the same marquee value as Jason or Freddy, and whose own successive entry had the power to turn off the casual viewer, instead entrapping those who became madly intrigued by the surreal and the absurd and fucking insane developments that the series would continuously offer over its 35 years in existence, Phantasm has its own slot on every horror aficionado's book shelf. And it honestly could not have been better.

Liz and the Creature: Mark Shostrom

Phantasm Exhumed covers every film in the Phantasm series, including the long-awaited and much-mooted Phantasm: RaVAger**, as well as the first two films in writer/director Don Coscarelli's career, Jim the World's Greatest and Kenny & Company. Prominent players from every film are on hand to share their recollections and experiences with the author, some with great fondness, some with bemusement, but all of them agreeing on one thing: that Don Coscarelli was a hell of a good guy, a kind-hearted professional, and destined to be making films. Chief among these participants are the hilarious A. Michael Baldwin (Mike), soft-spoken and humble Bill Thornbury (Jody), lovable Reggie Bannister (Reggie), and the absolutely eloquent Angus Scrimm (The Tall Man). Their voices join those of other familiar names, along with some not-so-familiar ones, to peel back their Phantasm curtain and let us phans in on the full story, much of it being shared for the first time. (On a personal note, I was also happy to see coverage of Jim the World's Greatest, as that remains a mythical part of Coscarelli's past. Once owned by Universal Studios, the film rights have since reverted back to the original production company, which no longer seems to exist. The film has never been released on any kind of home video format; the damned thing hasn't even leaked to Youtube or the torrent world [and believe me, I've been looking]. If this the closest I can ever get, I'd consider the matter at the very least satisfied.)

Considering myself a seasoned phan, I went into the book confident that I'd know a fair amount of the info to come - the three-hour cut of the first film; the cabin-fever setting where Don wrote the script; his original inspiration for making a horror film coming from a haunted-garage scene in Kenny & Company - but I was also confident I'd be learning stuff I hadn't previously known, being that I'm not that up my own ass. But I couldn't have prepared myself for how much I simply did not know about Phantasm and its phamily. Phantasm's original title was Morningside? Coscarelli originally tried to direct the eventual adaptation of Something Wicked This Way Comes before refashioning that concept into the Morningside script? Fucking Bill Thornbury met with George Lucas about possibly playing Luke Skywalker?

Holy shit!

And if you think I'm giving away all the non-common stuff, I haven't even scratched the surface of what Phantasm Exhumed has on display. Boasting interviews with every key player and crew member from the entire Phantasm series (though Coscarelli, as well as Phantasm II alumni James Le Gros and Paula Irvine, sadly declined involvement), and rare never-before-seen photos taken by the people who were there and experienced it first-hand, no kind of Phantasm retrospective will ever be as definitive. Prior to this, the Phantasmagoria documentary available only on the Anchor Bay UK Phantasm box set had been the ultimate phan experience.

Phantasm Exhumed now claims that honor. And all it took was a little digging.

The book is available now.

* It's time for someone to announce Chucky Unassembled: The Complete Child's Play History.
** Confession: I glossed over the section featuring Phantasm: RaVager, as I am trying to refrain from learning about the film as much as I can between now and its eventual release date.

PHANTASM EXHUMED: AN INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR DUSTIN McNEILL

When someone says the word “franchise” or “series” to a horror fan, inevitably that fan will immediately think of Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Halloween. Jason, Freddy, and Michael have been infamous horror genre boogeyman for approaching forty years. They are the next generation’s Dracula, Wolf Man, and Frankenstein’s Monster. But they are also, with all due respect, half-ideas and whisper-down-the-alleys. Their imperfectly perfect originals (each film for different reasons) have been fleshed out, explored, expanded upon, and exploited with multitudes of sequels and remakes, none of which had the input from the creative team responsible for bringing the groundbreaking original to screens. Their tangential mythologies have traversed such differing directions that they eventually no longer embodied what their original creators had established.

That cannot be said for the Phantasm series, which has seen the same writer/director on all four films, as well as most of the cast. In 1979, series creator Don Coscarelli unleashed upon the world an absurd and bizarre fever dream called Phantasm. And its main cast of A. Michael Baldwin, Reggie Bannister, Bill Thornbury, and the immeasurable Angus Scrimm have been along for the ride ever since. (I suppose we can “forgive” the presence of James LeGros as Mike in Phantasm II, but no forgiveness is necessary, as he was great in the role.)

Getting back to those aforementioned horror franchises, they have been lucky enough and beloved enough to receive respectful and definitive retrospectives with an assemblage of books (Crystal Lake Memories; Halloween: The Complete History) and video documentaries (Halloween: 25 Years of Terror; Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy).

Up to this point, beyond special features on DVD releases, no such attention has ever been paid to the Phantasm series, consisting of the original, Phantasm II, Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead, and Phantasm: Oblivion.
 

Enter Dustin McNeill, owner of the Phantasm Archives, moderator of the Phantasm Community, longtime Phantasm fan (er, phan, as we're often called), and now author, who has penned Phantasm Exhumed: The Unauthorized Companion, which streets late March from Harker Press. In the author's own words, Phantasm Exhumed is "a meticulously researched look at the chronological day-by-day making of the four Phantasm films from script page to world premiere as told through the stories and anecdotes of cast, crew, producers and effects makers. In addition to the four film sections, Phantasm Exhumed contains a Primordium chapter that covers in less detail the making of Don Coscarelli's first two films, Jim the World's Greatest and Kenny & Company...The book also benefits greatly from the inclusion of rare and unpublished journals by Angus Scrimm and Kristen Deem that collectively span all four films."

To quote the book's author, let's do a little more digging...

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Tall Man in Desert: Guy Thorpe

The End of Summer (TEOS): At what age did you discover the weird and wild world of Phantasm? Where were you, and which film was your first?

Dustin McNeill (DM): I was fifteen when I happened upon the original at my local video store. I thought it was terrific, but never gave any thought to there being sequels. When I discovered two years later that sequels existed, I very quickly tracked them down and thought they were just as great. Phantasm: Oblivion is my absolute favorite sequel. Parts II and III I dig almost equally, with a slight edge going to Phantasm II.

TEOS: What was it about the Phantasm series that drew you in?

DM: The Tall Man! What a great horror villain! He barely spoke, but when he did I hung on his every word. I immediately recognized that the series wasn't spoon-feeding the audience answers about him or the other weird goings-on. The mythology required that you figure out certain things for yourself. I loved that.

TEOS: I recall reading your excellent Phantasm article in a 2009 issue of HorrorHound Magazine. Was this you testing the waters for a run at a potential Phantasm book? Or did writing the article parlay into the idea that you could potentially write an entire series retrospective?

DM: Thanks for the kind words. It came together very quickly and I would've loved to have had more time on it. In 2009, I was just beginning work on my book when the HorrorHound opportunity presented itself. I wasn't really sure what the focus of my book was yet, though I sensed there was a huge demand for it. That the issue completely sold out and is now only available from collectors reinforced to me that there is a major audience waiting. That doesn't happen to every HorrorHound issue.

TEOS: Though Phantasm isn't as well-known a horror franchise as, say, Halloween or A Nightmare on Elm Street, phans have had the opportunity over the years to delve into publications like Fangoria, or your HorrorHound, or the expansive documentaries found on special edition DVD releases, to access a wealth of information on the making of the Phantasm films. What will your book be offering that previous sources have not?

DM: Great question. Everything you've read or seen about Phantasm so far has been in a general sense. Everything. My book is going to take a very detailed, chronological look at the making of these four films… meaning I take you back to March 20, 1977, when they shot the Tall Man chasing Mike through Morningside Mortuary for Phantasm. Or January 5, 1987, when they filmed Mike and Reggie raiding the hardware store for supplies for Phantasm II. Or February 23, 1993, when they filmed the Demon Nurse's attack on Mike and Reggie for Phantasm III. Or November 22, 1997, when the Tall Man tried to remove the sphere from Mike's head in Phantasm: Oblivion. Basically, this book is really digging deep with the details.

A huge inspiration for me in taking this direction was J.W. Rinzler's fantastic books on the makings of Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Being able to excerpt Angus Scrimm's unpublished Phantasm set journals also help set this book apart from everything that has come before. I think phans are going to really enjoy seeing those.

Liz and the Creature: Mark Shostrom

TEOS: Have you managed to attract previous members of the Phantasm phamily who have never before shared their experiences working on the films?

DM: Yes, very much so. I was surprised to be the first person to interview a number of people associated with the series. Ken Jones, the original sphere victim, has never had the opportunity to speak publicly about Phantasm. There are also people who've shared their experiences before, but not often and not in a long, long time, such as Kevin Connors and Gloria Lynne-Henry (Tim and Rocky from Phantasm III).

TEOS: You've previously shared that series creator Don Coscarelli is not involved with the book. Why did he refrain from participating?

DM: I can only speculate. I know he heard about the project years ago before I approached him, which did not bode well. Prior to the book, my main communication with Don were emails asking that I remove information or videos from my website, the Phantasm Archives, when I was posting news too early or something they wanted to save for a future DVD release. So I was never tight with him like I was the cast. Obviously, it would have been incredible to involve him. I imagine he will eventually read it and I hope he will like it. It is, after all, a warm tribute to his work.

TEOS: Besides Don, were there any other individuals from Phantasm history who proved elusive that you wish you could have interviewed?

DM: Willard Green, father of the original silver sphere! I grabbed a local fortuneteller and attempted a séance in hopes of getting an interview, but nothing came of it. Sadly, Green died before the original Phantasm saw release. He never had the opportunity to see his work on the big screen.

TEOS: Just out of personal curiosity, did you manage to score an interview with Kenneth Tigar, who played Father Meyers in Phantasm 2 ? I love that guy!

DM: Yes, Father Meyers is in here. Kenneth was terrific and had some great things to say about making Phantasm II. Of his character's silver-sphere demise, he said, "It was one of the most interesting things I've ever done in my entire career." I was excited to see him appear in The Avengers shortly after our interview. He played one of the few mortals that ever stood up to Loki!

TEOS: The book will be including rare and never-before-seen photographs from the productions of the Phantasm films. Where did you obtain them?

DM: The crew! A handful of interviews I did ended with someone saying, "Hey, I think I have some photos in storage somewhere if you want them." I wound up collecting more than a thousand unpublished photos from these films. Phantasm Exhumed is set to include more than 200 of them. The great thing is that a majority of these images, such as those from makeup effects creator Mark Shostrom, were digitally scanned in from their original negatives and look fantastic.

Mike Hanging: Guy Thorpe

TEOS:  Will you be delving into the unproduced script by Roger Avery, referred to as Phantasm: 1999?

DM: Yes, the book has an entire section dedicated to just that project. I don't want to say too much here because it's all there on the page - the multiple drafts, the changes, the cast reactions and the different reasons for it ultimately not being made. Exhumed also has sections dedicated to the aborted remake that New Line Cinema attempted and the Phantasm V project from a few years back—the one that generated the infamous cast reading.

TEOS: The trend seems to be, first, publishing the massive retrospective book, and then turning it into a video documentary, as was the case with Crystal Lake Memories, and Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film. Have there been any preliminary discussions about that?

DM: Not at all. I've been so engrossed in the book that I can hardly see anything beyond it. I was happy to have been involved in the Phantasm II blu-ray documentary a year back, but I think that will mark the extent of my documentary contributions to Phantasm. Not that there isn't ample footage/material out there with which to make a new documentary.

TEOS: Being that you maintain a close relationship with the cast, you would be privy to certain details that the general public are not. The possibility of a Phantasm V has existed for going on two decades. While I'm certainly not asking you to spill the beans on anything you may or may not know, instead I am asking, do you think phans will ever be blessed with a Phantasm V? 

DM: Yes, absolutely. You will totally see it. I've been saying on the Phantasm Archives and Phantasm Community that the official Phantasm camp have been filming it since 2008, but no one seems to pay attention to that. Heck, I even debuted the first photo from the project of Reggie on the Archives. It's been a grueling wait, but you will eventually see it. Can't spill any more beans on it than that.

TEOS: Why do you think the Phantasm series endures?  

DM: I think it endures for a number of reasons. So many elements come together to make these films work. You've got endearing performances from a terrific cast, a wonderfully intriguing story, solid direction, dazzling special effects, top-notch makeups, and unforgettable music. This is a franchise that, despite having gone direct-to-video, has yet to compromise itself. Few horror franchises can honestly claim that. There's also a timeless quality to the series in that these films don't really date themselves all that much. It endures for these reasons and more.

Mike and Tall Man: Mark Shostrom

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Phantasm Exhumed purchase details are still being worked out, though it will likely be available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble, directly from the publisher, and from the usual dotcoms. For the time being, keep an eye on the Phantasm Exhumed site for the latest details. That is, if you've got the...balls? (Yep, I did that.)

CREEP

Three years ago I went to a national chess tourney with some friends. We stopped off at a restaurant, and there was this older man there who claimed he was traveling cross-country, meeting famous people and the like. So the friends I'm traveling with - their Dad tells me to go interview him for the trip. I had brought along a video camera, you see, to document the trip and the tourney. So I went over to him and sat down and offered him an interview about his travels. He seemed jovial at first, but when I brought up cameras he became alarmed as hell, and very unsettled. I had to promise him not to record him in any way. I was a bit put off, but I agreed. So I decided to try my best to remember the conversation after we had it and I would jot it down later.

So for the first half of the conversation everything went pretty all right. He told me stories of his travels on the road, close calls in towns, people trying to mug him, close calls hitchhiking with people who turn out not so normal (ironic really), and places he'd been. He also liked talking up religion a lot. So then he starts talking about one time he camped outside of a town in Minnesota. He tells me how he stops at this diner, and this girl there starts hitting on him. The story got really weird, and long story short, it turned into him trying to run away from this girl after she found him at his campsite and tried to rape him. But I chocked it up as a tale he told to spice up the conversation because he enjoyed my company, and I let it go. 

But then he hit me with a zinger. He told me that he predicted what the girl was going to do. He told me he could predict things because he had power. He started talking about the Bible, God, and the second coming a lot. Then he got in my face and said he thought he could trust me. So he asked me if I wanted to know who he really was. I started getting really unsure about this whole thing, but I said sure. 

He took his hands and placed them on the table, laying them flat. On his palms were holes going straight through, from one side to the other. His feet had them too. He said he was marked as the Second Coming, and he was traveling the country bringing the truth and healing and helping others, and operating a website out of his van. He said he had not yet risen to power, but he would, and when he had met his quota, he would bring Heaven back to Earth. 

All I could think was "Holy shit, holy shit, this guy stabbed nails through his hands and feet. Please don't kill me, Mister. I've got so much to give." A friend of mine came over to tell me we were leaving at that point, and he also saw the "stigmata" on the guys hands. He just stared at it, like "Holy shit, does this guy think he's really Jesus Christ"? The guy told me his website. I looked it up later. It doesn't exist. I swear there was a van outside with a satellite dish though. I almost said there wasn't but then I remembered there was. He told us to be careful on our trip as bad storms would be coming and they would rain on the good and the wicked alike. Sure enough, on our way back days later, we ran through some pretty heavy, tornadic thunderstorms.

I'll never forget that shit as long as I live. I sat right across from a man who stabbed himself in the hands and feet with nails.

Story source.

Image source.

DAY 20: RECOMMENDED VIEWING – KENNY & COMPANY

 

When it comes to Halloween, you should know that it’s not just about the scare. While that’s a huge part of it, Halloween – like many other holidays in life – changes meaning the older you get. So when you are a child, Halloween is obviously married to the idea of childhood. Your Halloweens past were not about the costumes you wore (I myself could probably only name three without the aid of old photos), but about the kids you went trick-or-treating with. It’s about your friends, and the random memories you created that night as you walked your neighborhood streets. It’s about the misadventures you got into, and the trouble you avoided (or nearly did).

It’s reasons like this that Halloween is the purest holiday we have, because under its gothic décor, it stresses community, bonds, and friendships. And though these things may snuff out after a while, they’ll never be forgotten.

Don Coscarelli’s sophmore effort, Kenny & Company, is about these very same things. The director, most famously known for the Phantasm Series, as well as Bubba Ho-Tep and his newest, John Dies At the End, once again writes, produces, and directs this slice-of-life nostalgia piece about a small, nameless community in the Southern California suburbs. Our main character is Kenny (Dan McCann), a precocious kid experiencing all the same things we did as kids: bullies, crushes, life lesson, etc. Luckily he has his best friend, Doug (Michael Baldwin), to get him through it.

Kenny & Company takes place in the few days leading up to Halloween, and with it comes costume planning for the big night. But that’s not the only thing they’re up to. They’re constantly getting into mischief, usually on their own, but sometimes along with Doug’s dad, Big Doug, who has definitely bequeathed his more playful side to his son. All during the boys' misadventures, Kenny provides narration, sometimes in that “Wonder Years” type way where it sounds like reflection, but other times in a happening-in-the-moment way.

To summarize Kenny & Company is somewhat difficult, because the film doesn’t really have a plot—and that’s not a knock against it. Not at all. Kenny & Company plays less like a traditional movie that contains an inherent conflict, but it’s more about a snapshot consisting of 3-4 days between two friends. They get in random adventures where consequences would definitely present themselves and serve as some kind of catalyst for conflict, but then nothing happens. The film at times often feels like a collection of short vignettes. For instance: kids build a soapbox racer, kids test drive soapbox racer down steep hill, kids nearly die, kids throw soapbox racer off an overpass and never mention soapbox racing again. Fin. There are numerous examples like this which occur throughout.

The first time I watched Kenny & Company was due to nothing but curiosity. At that point I had seen nearly every one of Coscarelli’s films (except for The Beastmaster, which I believe he’s since disowned, as well as the ever-elusive Jim, the World’s Greatest). I was intrigued to see what an early effort from Coscarelli – a family comedy, no less – looked like. I expected to laugh once or twice and appreciate the film in a time capsule sort of way, but nothing beyond that. I was quite honestly surprised to see that while the film isn’t consistently laugh-out-loud funny, it’s most assuredly a good time.

The biggest selling point of Kenny & Company is that it's definitely a product of its time. The 1970s are known for having produced an onslaught of dark and bleak movies, and that goes for every genre. Most people point to the futileness the country was feeling in response to the Watergate scandal, and the needless and unending Vietnam War. And this dark mood extends to Kenny & Company as well. Not to say that the film is dark, but when compared to your typical kids’ films, it tackles a lot of serious themes—including death.  After all, Kenny’s dog, Bob, is slowly dying, and the family has no choice but to put him to sleep. This is Kenny’s first (but not last) exposure to death in the film, and it affects him in a big way. A lot of people believe that the best way to teach your children about death is to get them a pet while they’re young, so they can experience growing up with this companion by their side and witness the aging (and dying) process firsthand. This idea is provided and utilized to maximum effect. There’s an especially well-blocked and uninterrupted shot where the family takes their dog into the veterinarian’s office to put Bob to sleep, and the camera slowly pans around the entire waiting room as you see many other people holding their aged pets and looking sad, and as we, the audience, figure out that they’re all there for the same reason, we end up back on the closed vet’s door again and the family leaves, their eyes wide in shock, tears streaming down Kenny’s face. This kind of thought and dedication to serious themes are nearly absent from family films today. Instead, Bob the dog would be voiced by George Lopez and make joke after joke about enchiladas or bad Mexican water.

What also makes the film work is that the kids act, talk, and think like kids. They aren't unrealistically intelligent or perceptive, but they're not stupid, either. They're just kids, presented the way that kids should be. They like trouble, so they find ways to get into it. They make fun of each other, hit each other, and pull pranks on each other. And it all works to the intended comedic effect because it feels very real.

As a director, you can see Coscarelli finding his voice, and so the film contains that awkwardness prevalent in budding filmmakers. Some scenes could certainly have used some tightening, as they go on for too long and become a little awkward. But you also see the genesis of what’s to come in the first Phantasm, including shots of the kids riding their bikes down the street as the camera trails just in front of them. Also, the score by Fred Myrow alternates between generic '70s synthy cheeseball filler to genuine, nearly dreamlike music. Scenes that could have been played for laughs come off differently with this music, especially in the third act where Kenny faces off against his bully inside an old, eccentric woman’s house. The music is downright menacing, and it changes the tone of this scene drastically.

Kenny & Company is also a little less PC, both in front of the cameras and behind. Our characters constantly cuss, and they even teach the foreign kid to say “asshole,” who does so with extreme glee in his eyes. But behind the cameras, Coscarelli allowed his kid actors to do most of their “stunts.” Doug, especially, tucks, rolls, tumbles, crashes, and does almost every other manner of bodily harm to himself. I can’t explain why, exactly, but this adds to the movie’s charm.  Maybe it’s because kid actors during the '70s weren’t coddled and handled like newborn chicks as they are today, and this adds a slight edge.

Several Phantasm folks are present, including the aforementioned Michael Baldwin as Doug; Reggie Bannister as Kenny’s favorite teacher, Mr. Donovan; Ken Jones as the boys’ football coach (who would go on to play the caretaker who attempts to capture Mike Pearson in the Tall Man’s mausoleum and gets a sphere drill to the noggin for his troubles); and Terri Kalbus, who plays Kenny’s crush (as well as the fortune teller’s granddaughter). Much of the behind-the-scenes crew, including Coscarelli’s parents, and his producing partner, Paul Pepperman, would also carry over.

And yes, the reason while we’re all here: the sequence in which the kids put on their Halloween costumes and go trick-or-treating is certainly fun. It leads them to a house where its occupants have turned their own garage into a house of horrors (and also concludes a mystery that’s established in the second act). It is during this sequence where the kids are pursued by a costumed man in the dark that inspired Coscarelli to go on to write and direct Phantasm, citing his extreme lack of enjoyment in watching his audience become fearful of the events occurring in that haunted garage.

Is Kenny & Company a Halloween film? Not really—at least not in the traditional sense. But it does take place in the week leading up to it, it is very funny at times, and it certainly nails that nostalgic look back at childhood, of which Halloween was a very big part. It wouldn’t be the first film you would think to watch as we approach that late October day, but to do so wouldn’t be unheard of.

DO I DARE GET EXCITED?

From Dread Central:

Exclusive: Phantasm 5 a Reality

June 5th, 2012

You read the headline. You have the same questions we all do. While at this point in time we cannot elaborate on many details, we can tell you this... the ball has definitely not stopped spinning, and there are wonderfully ghastly things on the way!

Before we get into details surrounding what we know, remember this - we rarely publish stories that are pure rumor, and if we do, we're very upfront about it. We would NOT tell you guys that Phantasm 5 is happening and happening soon unless we were at least 95% sure of the news. That being said...

We just got off the wire with our very own Rob Delamorte, who has been informed by an extremely reliable source that Phantasm 5 is fully scripted and will begin filming this year. You can expect to hear more about this one soon.

Let the speculation begin.

Update

As expected, as of right now some of the folks behind the Phantasm franchise are either remaining tight-lipped or giving statements such as Don Coscarelli did to Bloody Disgusting... "I have no solid news to report on a new project now," which is kind of a standard and dubious answer. Why not just say this is definitely not happening or all the reports are false? There's always a margin for error when running a news site, but we're sticking to our guns with this one. Time will tell. Stay tuned.

I'd give this world a million Batmans, James Bonds, and Indiana Jones, if it gave me just one more Phantasm...