Heinz Hoogenboom
this film made shivers in the marrows of my bones like a rash of jelly? This long man is the pig spit of my uncle Callie - a repulsive fellow who used to laugh at me until I literally cried my eyes out. As you can imagine, the affect this fiml had on me was tenfold!. After viewing this film for the tenth time, I finally plucked up the courage to ring my estranged uncle. "Callie" I gobbled down the line. "Why did you used to mock me so? Why?" But of course the line was dead and I realized I never had an uncle Callie and the film had reawakened my other personality, archdeacon bubbles.
JLRVancouver
I remember seeing 'Phantasm' back in the late '70s and had enduring memories of 'the ball' and of the scene on the alien planet. When I recently re-watched it, I was somewhat surprised (and disappointed) by how brief these scenes actually are. I'd also forgotten how generally silly (the finger-fly-thing being a good example) and incoherent (try to explain the plot to the uninitiated) the film was. That said, it's still a classic (cult?, camp?) horror film from the golden-age of dead fornicating-teenagers. Despite its short celluloid life, 'the ball' earns the movie an extra rating point for inventiveness and excessive bloodiness.
InjunNose
A film overwhelmed by its own amateurishness, "Phantasm" is widely regarded as a classic...which only proves that the word "classic" means different things to different people. Presumably, the same criteria that a film in any other genre must meet to be considered a classic are applicable to horror movies, too: things like plot, characterization and atmosphere. "Phantasm" has none of these. It's just a patchwork quilt of visuals, a ninety-minute-long exercise in throwing nutty, surreal images at the wall to see what sticks. This gimmicky onslaught is accompanied by poor acting, crummy dialogue and lots of screaming (because, you know, it's a horror movie). But why are all these strange things happening to the characters? Why have Angus Scrimm and his army of dwarf slaves singled out these young men? Why is a shiny metallic ball equipped with multi-pronged blades hurtling through the corridors of the mortuary? Well, just because. It's like a story that one twelve-year-old kid might tell another, making it up as he goes along: "So there were these guys, and one day some really scary stuff went down." That's the level of intellectual sophistication one finds in "Phantasm". It scores a couple of points for sheer novelty, but that doesn't make it a good or even tolerable film.
TheRedDeath30
I am fairly well immersed in the horror community. I go to a dozen conventions a year. I talk about horror on social media frequently. I buy things from horror vendors (toys, t-shirts, etc). What I am trying to convey is that I think I am fairly in tune with the trends of the horror culture. This is one of those "forgotten out of mind" classics. What I mean by that is that I don't see the stars of this movie invited to conventions all that often. I don't see people talking about it all the time on social media. I don't see Phantasm toys, posters, t- shirts flooding the vendor stalls and websites. It's by no means a HALLOWEEN or Friday THE 13th. However, ask any horror fan if they like this movie and you will get a resounding yes. This fact was backed up last night (as I type this) as they re-released a remastered version to select theaters, most of which sold out, attesting to the love of this movie.As loved as it is, clearly what keeps it from being a certified classic is that it does have weaknesses, as well. It is certainly not a perfect film, but it is memorable and frightening. The movie occupies a strange place in its' classification. It's an American independent horror film, but feels far more in place with what European horror was doing at the time. This is no slasher, or mean- spirited grindhouse horror that was so popular with American horror audiences at the time. It is a surreal film, with a storyline that is all over the place, and a dreamlike tone that reminds me much more of the influence of the Italians. It is, also, not quite horror. There are clear sci-fi tones and influences here, which only begin to reveal towards the end of the film, but the big "reveal" of who the Tall Man is and why they are gathering bodies is certainly not your typical horror story. It has much more in common with sci-fi.The movie has several things in its' favor that have made it so loved by horror audiences, not the least of which is Angus Scrimm as The Tall Man, the movie's iconic villain. He has that old guy creepiness that works so well in a horror role, mixed with physical attributes that made him imposing. Let's not forget that voice, too, as he utters those classic lines...."Booooyyyy". He has an arsenal of weapons at his disposal, as well. We have the human familiar with almost traps our young hero in the crypt, another creepy old guy. There is the slut with the stiletto, who may or may not also be The Tall Man. A well-endowed young woman who lures men, siren-like, to their deaths in the graveyard. There are the evil Jawas, dwarf minions who always seem right around the corner. Then, of course, there is the ball of death, the orb that is so familiar as a part of this movie. It was originally given an X-rating because the orb scene was considered to be so gory and violent that they couldn't pass it with an R. Of course, now it look a little silly, but if you can let your imagination do a little work, it is still a frightening scene.The biggest thing going for this movie is that it has creativity in spades. I can't imagine sitting down to write this story. There are so many ideas here and plot strands going all over the place that someone's creativity was clearly running wild. That is, also, one of the weaknesses of the movie, though. The plot is all over the place. There is, at times, just far too much going on and some of it makes little to no sense. It feels like this could have been tightened into a masterpiece by eliminating one or two elements to bring more detail to the best ones, but part of its' charm is that "all over the place" feel.Know that this is low budget before you go in. The acting is very limited. The effects look like a high school AV club did them. One of our main heroes is a middle aged guy with a "skullet" who drives a 50s looking ice cream truck and wears silly bowties, all while playing a mean acoustic guitar. I don't, personally, hold any of that against this movie, but I know that there are plenty of millennials out there who will look at this and scoff, robbing themselves of the experience of seeing the type of movie that formulated your modern horror scene.The movie has spawned four sequels, to date, and the orb and Tall Man have become iconic. It may not be on anyone's Top Ten list of horror, but I think you would find that it's on a lot of Top 100 lists and that's nothing to scoff at, either.
