Phantasm

[joejoeherron]

I am a new member to this board, but I've never seen a mention to the Phantasm flicks.Are they whorthy of mention? I love them all. Some people love the Nightmare series or the Friday series, but I love the Phantam series.Any thoughs?

[Allhallowsday]

PHANTASM (1979) has been discussed on this forum.  You might try using the SEARCH feature to see what anyone has had to say about these movies.  I really like the first film, think it's underrated, and do like the second one, too.  I may have seen the third or fourth, but they hold no impression and little interest for me and I can't recall them.   

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1r0rm9HrpE  

[retrorussell]

I rather like the second one, much more than the first.  The idea of 3 killer balls was cool.  The Tall Man was better in this one and had a couple memorable lines of dialogue.  After that, the series took a bit of a nosedive as things got just too weird to accept and Reggie's horniness was a focus of "comedy".  Stick with the first two.

[fortunato]

One point of contention that I have here is with the way "bad" movies are defined.  Some, like Phantasm, The Evil Dead, and a few others, merely have low budgets, but are not in the same league with films like The Beast of Yucca Flats or The Indestructable Man.  Phantasm was quite good and I have enjoyed each of the sequels, too.

[Cthulhu]

One point of contention that I have here is with the way "bad" movies are defined.  Some, like Phantasm, The Evil Dead, and a few others, merely have low budgets, but are not in the same league with films like The Beast of Yucca Flats or The Indestructable Man.  Phantasm was quite good and I have enjoyed each of the sequels, too.

Oh, come on, The Beast of Yucca flats is awesome!

[Psycho Circus]

I posted my thoughts on KYGOTC's hilarious review of the film found here:

http://www.badmovies.org/othermovies/phantasm/

It caused quite a bit of a debate, even though it's just one persons opinion and there were a few that couldn't grasp that fact. I only really like the first film, as I felt the others got a bit too corny and that they could have been much more sinister. 

[AndyC]

I liked the first one, possibly best of all. It's got a nice, raw indie horror feel about it, the ideas were fresh and the low budget kept things simple. The second is good too, however, and it has a lot to offer. Bit more tongue-in-cheek, but not excessively so, and I liked how it took things to the next level, with Mike and Reggie going on the offensive as a couple of monster hunters with cool homemade weapons. The retconning had begun, but was still only minor. And come to think of it, the release of Phantasm 2 was what convinced me to check out the original. I'd seen Phantasm on the shelf at the local video store, but until the ads for 2 started running, I had no idea what it was about or any particular interest in checking it out.

The series went downhill from there, I think. Too much fiddling with the story and too much information. Both are pretty much inevitable with multiple science fiction sequels, but I liked the added mystery of the first two, and the simplicity. A creepy undertaker has been hanging around a small town for at least a century, harvesting the recently-deceased and killing the odd live one to support what appears to be an extradimensional slave trade. The details are mainly left to your imagination, as they should be. The ball is possibly the coolest thing in the movie, but its role is kept to that of a robotic sentry.

I don't particularly care for sequels that start altering their own backstory or giving away excessive amounts of information that conflicts with what my imagination has already filled in. And while Phantasm had a 70s indie film feel to it, and Phantasm 2 was an 80s theatrical release through and through, everything that came after had a definite 90s straight-to-video stink about it. Cheap, but not in a way that enhances the atmosphere. Just cheap. And the story starts to get too convoluted and contradictory, just to allow more sequels. I'd almost compare it to Highlander in that respect.

[The Burgomaster]

I love PHANTASM.  Part II is pretty good, too.  But I don't think the other sequels are very good.

[Intangible Skeleton]

The scene where you see the Tall Man walk down the street is probably the most atmospheric scene in the movie. I always thought his walk was kind of funny, due to the way he's swinging his arms like they're made out of rubber. And then he goes up to an Ice Cream truck and takes a deep breath in like he really likes the cold, but on Wikipedia I read there was going to be a scene where they hurt him with the cold (a fire-extinguisher IIRC), but it was cut from the movie. Kind of confusing, because he doesn't really look he's pain there, though I guess it's logical if he comes from such a hot planet as we see.

When I think of it, the Tall Man is kind of like "Space Satan" because his planet is essentially Hell and he turns you into a demon minion once you die.

[joejoeherron]

thankns for the info. i need to do more site surfing in the furture.