HALLOWEEN HORRORS (cont.)

For the 2024 SEASON!

PHANTASM II (1988)

PHANTASM II arrived nearly a decade subsequent to the original cult classic - in the Summer of 1988 when the horror craze was at its peak. Unlike the original, ‘TASM II was distributed by UNIVERSAL PICTURES, it had a very respectable budget, and even got a red carpet opening at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre.

PHANTASM II is a PHANTASTIC sequel in every way - unfortunately, subsequent entries in the franchise were schlocky, badly drawn and scripted, direct to video affairs; but the first two films are just great. And taken together represent a single narrative in the same way the original HALLOWEEN and HALLOWEEN II are structured.

The story opens at the EXACT moment of the original film’s conclusion - and despite the footage being shot a full DECADE later, it is seamless. Viewed side by side, it looks impeccable but for the fact that returning actor/secondary protag Reggie Bannister has obviously aged in the interim.

PHANTASM II belongs as much to the 1980s as the original did the 1970s - and it is the consummate AMERICAN horror/science fantasy/action movie in my opinion. The jist is that ten years after their first battle with the malevolent, interdimensional entity known only as, ‘‘The Tall Man’’, Mike has been wallowing in a mental institution, while Reggie seems to believe - owing to a combination of trauma and manipulation by The Tall Man - that the bizarre horrors experienced by himself, Mike and Jody were some sort of collective delusion or fugue experience.

The narrator of the film is a teenaged girl named Liz Reynolds who is psychically linked to Mike and The Tall Man by way of dreams and nightmarish waking episodes. The Tall Man has grown exponentially more powerful in the intervening years - travelling from town to town, capturing the recently dead and transforming them into grotesque, dwarfish slaves - and murdering the living for the same malevolent purpose so as to satiate the seemingly endless demand for slaves on his home world. It becomes clear that The Tall Man will have soon reduced the entire West Coast, and eventually the Continental United States to a wasteland/slave plantation of the dead.

Mike and Reggie - and their new ally, Liz - do what any Red Blooded, Reagan era Americans would do during any hot summer of the Cold War: They load up a 1971 Hemi Cuda with sawed off shotguns, .45s, chainsaws, flamethrowers and hatchets and set out to WASTE The Tall Man and his minions and send them back to Hell.

This movie is great fun - and it very much builds on the lore of, The Tall Man, his killer spheres, and his motives.

The apocalyptic tenor is very much within the zeitgeist of the 1980s, and nuclear war anxieties therein. Similarly, the message of overcoming by way of toughness, knowhow and raw FIREPOWER is subtlety patriotic but not in a foolish or annoying way. I think of ‘TASM II as sort of the RED DAWN of horror films - watch it BACK 2 BACK with the original on a cold night this Halloween season. It is absolutely DOPE.

HENRY: PORTRAIT of a SERIAL KILLER (1988)

HENRY: PORTRAIT of a SERIAL KILLER was hugely controversial upon release. Michael Rooker, in his breakout role, plays ex-con, and part time exterminator ‘‘Henry’’ (his last name is never given). A drifter who, for the duration of the weeks and months captured by the film’s narrative, finds himself staying on Chicago’s North Side in a ratty apartment with his dimwitted, former cellmate, ‘‘Otis’’ (played excellently by Tom Towles).

Shot in cinema verite style, the story is episodic and meandering - just like Henry’s life. Henry meanders through meals at grimy diners, extermination gigs, and endless driving in a barely running, rattletrap Ford. He also kills virtually everyone he meets and gets to know in any capacity beyond the most fleeting and brief interaction.

Loosely based on the case of Henry Lee Lucas and Otis Toole, HENRY faced much resistance from distributors and public morals NGOs alike. During this time, serial murder was in the news almost nightly - and it had reached epidemic proportions in some big cities and especially in Los Angeles. It was viewed as distasteful, morbid, and exploitative to make films about the subject.

This negativity was mitigated somewhat however, by the high acclaim the film received in arthouse circles and at various showings across film festivals.

This movie is raw and brutal - and very very bleak. But it DOES represent the reality of serial murder - without the obnoxious and cringe campiness of prime time nonsense and Hollywood movies.

As Henry explains to Otis after initiating him into the practice of casual, recreational murder, ‘‘Its either you or them’’. HENRY is a predator who annihilates his fellow man or woman because he is a predator - and the predator’s vision is exceptionally reductionist and binary. Henry does NOT kill because he’s a snarky Gay man who dislikes rude people, nor is he some ridiculous avenger in the vein of ‘‘DEXTER’’ - Henry drops bodies because that’s what he IS. Killing is just what he DOES.

Absolutely the DARKEST SIDE of ‘WOOD LIFE. A MUST SEE!

PRINCE of DARKNESS (1987)

This is probably my absolute favorite John Carpenter film - and it is the second entry in what Carpenter dubbed his, Apocalypse Trilogy (the BOOKENDS of the trilogy being, THE THING and IN the MOUTH of MADNESS).

PRINCE of DARKNESS opens as a Priest seeks the help of a quantum physics professor and his team of graduate students - the Priest is the vicar of a Los Angeles church, which housed a secretive Roman Catholic order called, The Brotherhood of Sleep. As the Priest discovers, a bizarre liquid substance is housed securely in the basement of the parish under lock and key; and as he observes it, he quickly realizes it is sentient in some way.

As the Physics team sets up shop at the Church, they realize that they are receiving TACHYON transmissions that appear to be from the future - a black, robed figure appears in the doorway of the church, while an ominous, AI altered voice reads a prompt over and over: ‘‘This is being broadcast from the YEAR ONE NINE, NINE-NINE, this is NOT a DREAM. This is being broadcast from…’’

It quickly becomes apparent that some sort of liminal event of the most sinister type is underway - locust plague descends on the city, night and day appear to be inconsistent or reversed. Street people have taken to a zombie like affect.

To the horror of the Holy man and his scientist charges, it becomes clear that the viscous, sentient fluid is in fact some sort of extraterrestrial being - that is indeed the same entity that is commonly associated with the figure of the ANTI-CHRIST, if not with Satan himself.

This is a very SMART movie - and despite the absurd subject matter, the theoretical postulates and philosophical conflicts discussed therein are remarkably accurate. Its neither a conventional horror movie, nor a true science fiction piece. Its BOTH and NIETHER. And its incredibly creepy. Watch with the lights off to set and maintain the mood.

Carpenter fans will appreciate Donald Pleasance in a starring role - as well as much of the cast of BIG TROUBLE in LITTLE CHINA.