Phantasm

0:23 Lee Good evening and welcome to Horror, I'm Lee.

0:26 Chris I'm Chris.

0:27 Adam And I'm Adam. Booy.

0:33 Lee And we are here again this evening with spoilers and swearing to discuss 1979's Phantasm.

0:40 Lee a film in which there's some strange goings on at a cemetery including a tall man, some jawas, and a woman with strange boobs.

0:54 Lee But it it turns into something far more sinister because our protagonist is one of the creepiest people to have ever been on film, but we'll we'll get to Michael in a bit.

1:06 Lee

1:08 Lee Before we get into that, Chris, what did you make of your first viewing of this movie?

1:13 Chris Fortunately, I did watch the correct Phantasm.

1:17 Chris But I don't know that I know any more than I would have done if I'd watched the other one.

1:24 Chris There's a, it's quite a surreal.

1:25 Chris I mean, am I asleep, am I dreaming?

1:30 Chris Or is it all really happening?

1:32 Adam It does play a lot on that, yeah.

1:35 Chris Yeah.

1:36 Chris And quick shout out to the the music, which

1:39 Chris is it a bit of a bit of tubular bells?

1:41 Adam It sounds like tubular bells going on maybe mixed with with Carpenter.

1:45 Chris Yeah.

1:46 Adam Sort of.

1:46 Chris Kind of.

1:47 Adam Yeah, that's a guy called Fred Miro and I fucking love that piece of music.

1:50 Adam It is just

1:52 Chris It is so.

1:53 Adam Yeah, it's it's really it really reminds me of like Goblin, so it is that sort of tubular-bellsy sort of sounds.

2:01 Adam But also you've got the sort of like choir pads and stuff like that, and.

2:08 Chris It really does set the atmosphere.

2:10 Adam It really, really does.

2:12 Lee Yeah, definitely.

2:13 Adam Because they because because it's credited Fred Miro and Malcolm Seagrove, but Malcolm Seagrove basically what we would now call a sound designer on it.

2:22 Adam Okay.

2:23 Adam And he does like the sound of the spheres and the gateway and sort of and everything, you know, so he's more that end of it, but yeah.

2:30 Chris The spheres are pretty weird.

2:32 Adam Oh, mate, yeah.

2:34 Lee There's a lot of imagery in this film that works really well, whether the story works or not.

2:39 Lee It's something we'll get into later, but it's definitely got a lot of really good ideas.

2:41 Lee A lot of really sinister imagery in it, which I think is good.

2:45 Lee So, so so that works for you, Chris.

2:48 Chris Yeah, yeah.

2:49 Chris I you know, assuming I do know what's going on, which, as you just suggested, I don't know if I definitely do, but

2:59 Chris you know, is it is it that there's really a guy doing some weird stuff with some other world realm and what do you call them, jawas who were were dead people, or is it I mean is it partially Mike dealing with death and these are his fever dreams to do with his parents having died and his brother having died.

3:24 Adam His or his brother leaving him, yes, of like and then it yeah.

3:29 Lee I think that's why we haven't covered it, I know we said, you know, last week when we said, oh, how come we've never covered this?

3:33 Lee I think I know the reason we've never covered it.

3:35 Lee Like I don't can't decide how I feel about it.

3:37 Lee And I don't think I ever have.

3:39 Lee It's one of those films, like I've seen it a lot.

3:40 Lee I've seen it loads of times.

3:42 Lee so it does come off the shelf quite often.

3:44 Lee But I think the end upsets me.

3:48 Lee I don't like the end and I

3:50 Chris At first I was like,

3:51 Chris Who is he talking to, is it definitely, I mean, it looked like it was Reggie, I was like, am I definitely getting this?

3:59 Chris Like, because I'm pretty sure I just saw him.

4:00 Lee Yeah.

4:00 Lee So he was dead.

4:02 Lee So if it was all a dream and his brother's really dead and everything that we've just seen was all just a dream.

4:07 Lee Why is the tall man then there at the end?

4:11 Lee Like it doesn't make any sense.

4:13 Lee And it drives me wild.

4:15 Adam Yeah.

4:16 Adam See, this is the this is the sort of shit that excites me, because I just love that level of obscurity.

4:21 Adam especially because it kind of is a proper horror film.

4:26 Lee Definitely.

4:26 Adam In the initial stages and the tall man is a proper horror.

4:30 Chris Yeah.

4:31 Adam Yeah.

4:32 Adam But then it goes fucking mad.

4:36 Adam And you've got and then it becomes sci-fi, but not in it's it's hinting at it.

4:46 Chris It's hinting at it.

4:47 Adam Yeah.

4:48 Adam It's kind of like there's it's kind of like that sort of thing of it's like Scooby-Doo, but in Scooby-Doo, it's like, oh, there can't really be a vampire monster.

4:58 Adam And it turns out to be a guy in disguise who's using it and everything.

5:02 Adam Whereas this is like, oh, he can't really be an undead sort of like stranger.

5:06 Adam Oh, no, he's from another dimension and actually what he's doing is he's kidnapping the dead, shrinking them so that they will fit in his high gravity environment and pushing them through a tuning fork that branches across realities.

5:23 Lee But again, the problem with that is,

5:25 Lee Then if and I got that, they were shrinking them down because of the gravity on the planet.

5:30 Lee So why is the tall man, the tallest man ever?

5:33 Chris Oh, yeah.

5:34 Lee He can't come from there, is he just coming here?

5:36 Chris He's got special powers.

5:38 Lee I mean he has because he manages to to turn into.

5:41 Lee So he's definitely something.

5:43 Chris Turn into a.

5:43 Lee supernatural or alien woman.

5:46 Chris I like the fact that he he waited till the end.

5:50 Chris of of the session to turn back into the guy to stab him.

5:53 Adam There is a there is a sort of question there that you hope that it's a fully physical transformation and not just a glamour.

6:02 Adam And they are shagging Angus Scrimm.

6:04 Chris Yeah.

6:05 Adam You know.

6:05 Adam And not realizing.

6:07 Lee I should have known that that woman wasn't really that woman from the fact of her unnatural positioning.

6:12 Lee When she's laying with that Andy Nyman look alike right at the very beginning, her her legs are front down laying as if she's laying on top of him facing him.

6:21 Lee But then every time it cuts to his face, she's upright as if she's sitting on him, I was like, so she's bending at her hips backwards.

6:27 Chris She's got some good contortion skills.

6:30 Lee Like that's not right.

6:31 Lee There's something going on there.

6:34 Lee I mean, that's a problem for the start.

6:37 Adam I I love I also love the fact that they've they've given Andy Nyman as you called him, they've given him distinctive facial hair so you can realize that it's him shrunk into a goblin.

6:45 Adam Yes, halfway through the film, you know.

6:47 Adam And again, I love that when it's like.

6:49 Adam It it's like that's the thing I love like I'm saying the Scooby-Doo thing is because it's kind of like here's explanations, but they're more fucking weird than what we thought was going on initially.

6:59 Adam And similarly with that, it's like we're being chased by a driverless car. Oh, no, it is being driven by like a shrunk down human being who can't see over the fucking steering wheel.

7:07 Adam And you're like,

7:09 Adam that's more mental.

7:12 Adam That's more insane and strange and I just, yeah, I can't help it.

7:17 Lee It did make me laugh that bit with the car as well.

7:19 Lee When he jumps out the roof with the shotgun, he's like, I'm going to nail this bastard.

7:24 Lee I was like, nobody in there.

7:25 Lee What are you going to shoot, like you've just said nobody's driving this car.

7:29 Lee And then immediately, I'm going to kill him.

7:31 Lee Who are you going to kill, the car?

7:32 Lee What are you doing?

7:34 Adam Well, he does aim at the engine block, so, but yeah, he does seem to personify that car as as it's driver in a way.

7:40 Adam Also, that's the other thing as well that I just I always forget that it's really oddly like irresponsible.

7:50 Adam In the way that a 13 year old being brought up by his 20 year old brother with, you know, they've they've got money and time on their hands.

8:03 Adam So, yeah.

8:04 Adam There's there's a lot of guns knocking about the shop and the improvised explosive that he makes out of a fucking shotgun shell.

8:12 Lee The whole time I was watching that, I was like, that someone has got to think, put in a pin in the bottom of a shotgun cartridge and then banging it on a desk with your hand.

8:21 Lee I was like, he should have blown his hand up.

8:23 Lee And I wish he had, because that character, the actor's very good, that character is the most annoying human being I've possibly ever seen on TV.

8:32 Lee He drives me up the fucking.

8:34 Lee I know he's supposed to be our protagonist.

8:38 Lee But I hate everything about the character.

8:40 Adam He's awful.

8:41 Adam He he's I I he's definitely annoying as well.

8:46 Adam You you do sort of sit there and sympathize with Jody and you're like.

8:50 Adam fuck sake, yeah, just.

8:54 Adam I just want to play guitar with the ice cream man.

8:57 Adam Are you just leave it.

8:59 Adam I'm I'm trying to sleep, I'm trying to sleep with an undead mortician disguised as a woman, will you not run out the bushes, please?

9:07 Lee Oh, that's right.

9:08 Lee When you're talking about the bit when they're on the porch and he's got that tuning folk that's in the key of foreshadowing.

9:13 Adam Yeah.

9:14 Lee Yeah, I caught that with that.

9:18 Adam That said, in fairness, the first time that someone sees this, there is no way that that foreshadowing would be you you would decrypt that.

9:26 Chris Yeah, anything from.

9:28 Adam You know what I mean, it's not like sort of like.

9:31 Chris Aside from it seeming quite an odd like there's something there, but.

9:35 Adam Yeah, it's quite.

9:37 Adam Oh, and once again, it's like, oh, it's quite odd.

9:40 Adam Oh, the explanation is far odder.

9:42 Chris It's true.

9:43 Adam Yeah, right.

9:44 Adam Okay, thanks.

9:45 Adam That's.

9:47 Adam Top top work.

9:49 Adam I do get that sort of thing, I think that's one of the things I like with it is I do get that feeling that it's again, if you encountered something supernatural or something alien or pan-dimensional.

9:59 Adam Yeah, it'd be really fucking weird and confusing and.

10:03 Lee Yeah.

10:04 Adam You know.

10:04 Adam There was like, yeah, and then his fingers turned into an insect.

10:06 Chris Yeah.

10:07 Adam Hey.

10:08 Lee You know.

10:08 Lee I always forget that.

10:09 Lee That is such a weird random.

10:12 Lee But again, it it fits with this film because it's.

10:15 Lee It's got so many ideas and it just throws them out and it goes, I don't doesn't matter if they don't yell together.

10:22 Lee Just throw it all in.

10:23 Lee And it and and I mean, obviously, there was an element of that in the 70s, like films that if these films were made now, everyone would tear them to pieces because they want a level of realism.

10:32 Lee But films like this and The Gate and films like that, they are just mental and you do just go with it for some reason.

10:38 Adam This I think it would get it would get lauded a lot more for its inventiveness if it was Italian.

10:45 Adam Yes, people would go down that because a lot of Italian.

10:48 Adam horror is very sort of jump and jumpy and multi-realities and you know, it's like we're piling on effects here.

10:55 Adam But not necessarily in any rational way to the plot or whatever.

11:03 Adam And but also I think also if you release this now, you do it in black and white and release it on A24.

11:10 Lee Yeah.

11:11 Adam And they and you know.

11:14 Adam And people would be like, oh, this is.

11:15 Adam this is incredible.

11:17 Adam You know.

11:17 Adam I think that's the thing is I don't think it gets the credit for being fucking a nice like absolutely surreal fucking thing.

11:26 Adam It's its own myth.

11:27 Adam It's not drawing on anything, you know, it's not.

11:30 Adam Oh, it it doesn't even work as like, oh, it's an alien film.

11:33 Adam But it's not any alien film you've ever fucking seen, it's not Fire in the Sky or.

11:38 Adam Body snatchers or something.

11:41 Lee No, and that.

11:42 Lee And and and when he goes to see the old woman, the old fortune teller.

11:47 Lee And they just have this who who apparently is from Dune because she's got a black box that you put your hand in for no reason.

11:53 Lee Like, none of that has any reason being in this film.

11:57 Lee But you just go with it.

11:58 Chris I assume that was a tribute to Dune.

12:01 Adam Yes.

12:02 Chris I was thinking, I'm pretty sure this was after.

12:03 Lee Yeah.

12:03 Chris Yeah.

12:03 Lee And the bar was called.

12:04 Adam Yes, it's after the book, but obviously it's before anyone actually made a film of Dune.

12:10 Adam So it's coming from the book at this point.

12:13 Adam But also if you're talking about things that ripped off Dune, just an interesting little note, Captain Phasma in the later trilogy is called Phasma because she JJ Abrams named her after the spheres from Phantasm.

12:25 Adam Because she's like she's like a mirror suit, she's.

12:28 Chris Yeah.

12:29 Chris It's pretty cool.

12:29 Adam Yeah.

12:30 Adam but but yeah, no, I knew you'd spot the but but also the.

12:37 Adam bar where Jody drinks is called June's Cantina, so it's I think it's definitely in there.

12:43 Adam It's like, no, I know what I'm doing.

12:45 Adam But also, yeah, it sort of that at that point, that was just a lot of very literate stoners nodding along in the cinema.

12:51 Adam Rather than sort of people had seen the the the blockbuster version, you know.

12:58 Lee Yeah, so it's it's and it's a strange pacing as well, I always find with this film.

13:04 Lee It's it's a very short film, but it somehow feels longer than it is.

13:10 Lee Not in a in a boring way, but it feels like a lot of story goes in and there's a lot of different twists and turns, yeah, for under an hour and a half.

13:19 Adam Yeah.

13:20 Adam Yeah, because I it is a lot.

13:23 Adam Yeah, there's a lot packed in.

13:25 Adam You know, and and not.

13:27 Adam And quite like very.

13:30 Chris And a lot to unpack.

13:30 Adam Disjointed in a way because you're like.

13:32 Adam Because it's a really weird version of the cop out of oh, it was all just a dream.

13:39 Adam And then as you're saying, then they just flip it at the end and it's like, no, this is the this isn't the dream, this is really happening.

13:46 Chris I liked it when his brother says, Jody says, oh, look up the house title or something.

13:51 Chris And it's like, I'm thinking,

13:54 Chris I think you're going to need to put up some serious boarding on those windows and yeah, just just straight through, no problem.

13:59 Adam Also, I mean, I love that, I mean, even down to that, like I said, there's a there's that weirdly sort of.

14:05 Adam I think now if you made this, this would get a high rating more on the basis of imitable behavior for a like for a young teenager.

14:15 Adam Of like, oh, yeah, no, I'll just sit up all night with a shotgun under me arm, you know, when Jody comes in and has to like.

14:23 Adam I'm not going to make him.

14:25 Adam I'm not going to wake him up.

14:26 Lee Yeah.

14:27 Adam Because I think he might be a bit jumpy.

14:30 Lee Right.

14:31 Lee Well,

14:31 Lee what do you expect?

14:32 Lee He spends the his daytimes joy riding around the cemetery between the gravestones on a motorbike.

14:38 Lee Like he's a dick.

14:39 Lee This kid is a nightmare.

14:41 Lee And then he's and then he just spies on his brother.

14:43 Lee Which is really.

14:45 Lee Like I mean that's like that is full on stalking for his brother, isn't it?

14:49 Lee That's proper wrong.

14:51 Lee yeah.

14:52 Lee No wonder his brother wants to move away.

14:54 Lee They drive you mad.

14:55 Adam Again, I think we get to that like we said about with Nope, you know, is that it's an again.

15:03 Adam It's weird to have that family dynamic in something.

15:07 Adam Where it's just like the like the older and younger brother.

15:11 Adam And and again, it's like, well, it's literally the only reason they'd be hanging around because if Jody wasn't related to Mike, he would have had him arrested or kicked his fucking ass.

15:19 Adam Told him to fuck off.

15:20 Adam Who are you, mate?

15:22 Lee But I mean, he's the only one who can fix the car by the looks of it.

15:25 Adam Yeah.

15:26 Lee And I'm sure that car is only in there because this is one of those films that I always watch.

15:33 Lee And it starts off and it's everyone's haircuts and everyone's clothes.

15:36 Lee And I get about 15 minutes in, I'm like, I hate everything about the 70s.

15:41 Lee Nothing good ever came out of the 70s, and then that Barracuda turns out every time I go, oh, that's so pretty.

15:46 Adam I knew the I knew the car would be the selling point, so.

15:50 Adam but I can assure you because I've I've got the the marvelous Arrow box set that comes with a sphere.

15:57 Adam on Blu-ray.

15:59 Adam And I decided, right, that's it.

16:01 Adam Cuz I hadn't seen, I don't think I've I don't think I've ever seen anything past two.

16:05 Adam The box set's been sitting there and I was like, right, I'm doing the lot.

16:07 Adam Can I assure you that in terms of mythology and things, you know, within the story, they reveal a lot.

16:18 Chris Oh, okay.

16:19 Adam And.

16:20 Adam It makes less sense.

16:22 Adam It's fucking.

16:22 Adam It's it's like everything they do is almost like,

16:28 Adam So now you know what's inside the sphere.

16:30 Adam Right, okay, I'm not going to spoil it for you.

16:32 Adam But it's like, once you know what's inside the sphere.

16:34 Adam I was like, well, of course it fucking is.

16:36 Adam Okay, right, come on, crack on.

16:38 Adam This is you're still a weird film.

16:41 Adam And you still have that sort of reality problem, you know.

16:45 Lee It's sort of.

16:46 Lee I'm definitely, I'd say I.

16:47 Lee I think I might have seen two but nothing else.

16:50 Lee But it was a very long time ago.

16:50 Lee But I've got your old box set, Adam, because when you pulled the Arrow one, you gave me your old box set, didn't you?

16:55 Lee Yeah.

16:55 Lee And this has prompted me, I am going to go and watch the other films.

17:02 Chris What, so how many are there?

17:04 Adam There's five in total.

17:05 Chris Five including the recent one.

17:07 Adam So, yeah.

17:10 Adam So you've got, obviously you've got Phantasm 79, you've got Phantasm, then 88 they do Phantasm 2 and Jody's not in it and they've recast Michael.

17:25 Chris It's quite a long quite a long time between.

17:29 Adam Yes, so there's quite a long time.

17:31 Adam It's a different actor and basically it was because.

17:35 Chris Okay.

17:39 Adam

17:41 Adam A Michael Baldwin, A Michael Baldwin.

17:46 Adam Yes.

17:46 Adam Not D Michael Baldwin, the woods are full of them.

17:50 Adam

17:51 Adam He he basically he'd retired from acting.

17:55 Adam So Universal were backing Phantasm 2, so they said, I, we want a working actor in like someone who's actually currently an actor.

18:03 Adam Not someone who'd just be returning because they've given up.

18:07 Adam You know, not given up, but retired, he'd gone on to like he's he's an acting teacher now.

18:13 Adam

18:13 Lee He's very that's what I've said earlier.

18:16 Lee He's a very good actor, it's the character that's annoying.

18:18 Adam Character's bloody annoying.

18:19 Adam Yeah.

18:20 Adam But that's the thing so, so they replaced him in two.

18:24 Adam And Jody's dead.

18:27 Adam But the way they sort of do it is that at the end of the first film, Reggie was basically trying to get Michael to go like leave it.

18:35 Adam By sort of saying to him, oh, it was all a dream and you've just imagined it and everything so that he wouldn't get hurt, basically.

18:43 Adam And and then he has to rescue him for.

18:44 Adam Literally, it comes in from the start of the film.

18:48 Adam So you've got the original Michael in there in this sort of flashback reality.

18:53 Adam And then it's cut to, seven years later.

18:55 Chris Right.

18:56 Adam And there's a different there's a different guy playing him.

18:59 Adam And then you get Phantasm 3, Lord of the Dead in 1994.

19:04 Adam So again, there's quite a big gap, there's like six years between that.

19:08 Adam and Mike's back, like the original Mike is back playing him.

19:12 Adam So he after after that Michael Baldwin comes out of retirement to do Phantasm films.

19:20 Adam But other than that, he's a working like acting teacher, so he's not, you know, he's not he's not an actor.

19:26 Adam He's but yeah, he comes out retirement and does them.

19:28 Adam And actually, it's really weird to see him older.

19:33 Adam Even though and I think it's because you like when I was watching them, I didn't quite realize the timeline that was going on.

19:39 Adam Because it's like.

19:40 Chris That's what I was wondering.

19:41 Adam You know, he he is noticeably older.

19:45 Adam You know, and and and he would be because he is old.

19:48 Adam And also standing next to Reggie who, you know.

19:50 Adam Bald men don't age.

19:50 Chris Yeah.

19:51 Adam I mean, the the the ponytail, yes, that ages.

19:55 Adam But no, but like the, you know.

19:58 Adam So he Reggie doesn't look much different.

20:02 Adam but then also they introduce other characters, they introduce Jody comes back because again, the guy who plays Jody, Bill Thornberry is a musician.

20:13 Adam That's his own song that they play on the porch.

20:18 Chris Oh, I didn't wonder.

20:19 Chris Because they they did seem decent, so it's like.

20:22 Adam Yeah, Reggie Bannister who plays who plays Reggie, is also a

20:27 Adam musician as well, I mean he's he's an actor primarily, but he's released like albums and stuff.

20:32 Adam But yeah, Michael sorry, Bill Thornberry again comes back to acting to be in Phantasm films, but other than that, he's a working musician and like songwriter and stuff.

20:42 Adam And

20:43 Adam So, yeah, so Phantasm 3 comes along.

20:45 Adam And so you've got the original Mike's back and Jody comes back, but Jody is now a sphere who can who can project himself.

20:55 Adam Like who who sort of can project a human form but basically has to keep turning back into a sphere.

21:02 Adam And basically.

21:03 Chris And going and killing people.

21:04 Adam He basically becomes Al to Reggie's Dr. Sam Beckett from Quantum Leap.

21:12 Adam He can basically appear and talk to him and advise him, but that's it, he's not really.

21:18 Chris Okay.

21:19 Adam Yeah, like I say, it it gets fucking stranger.

21:22 Adam Then you've got Phantasm 4 Oblivion and that uses because when they filmed the original Phantasm, they had about six different endings that they filmed.

21:29 Chris

21:31 Adam So they used those in Phantasm 4 as flashbacks.

21:35 Adam So there's all new bits of the original Phantasm film in that, which is really good because obviously it's the same actors but looking younger and it's of the time, so it really is great.

21:46 Adam and that was 98, and then in 2016 they did Phantasm Ravager, which is the first one that Don Coscarelli doesn't.

21:53 Chris Oh, okay.

21:55 Adam He writes and produces it, but he doesn't direct it.

21:57 Adam So another guy comes along and does that.

22:00 Adam If I'm honest, the one thing I will say is that I think the Phantasm films could be a brilliant study for someone of the progression of horror cinema through the 80s.

22:11 Chris

22:12 Adam Because so 79 it's basically the 80s.

22:16 Adam But it just like you say, it's clearly the 70s because everyone looks like they're in the full guy and you know.

22:22 Adam Is.

22:24 Adam But you're sort of getting into that video era of this is one of those films like we said was a video shop staple, that's where we all sort of saw it originally and stuff.

22:34 Adam And then but then by the time you get to 88, obviously it's got better production values and stuff like that, but it's also sort of added different elements and things.

22:43 Adam And then then you've got 94 and 98 and they feel so 94 and 98 in terms of the production and horror and everything else like that.

22:53 Adam And then in 2016 you get one that's not the original director but it's a fan, so it feels like when they did like Halloween 2018 and things like that.

23:02 Adam But also the great thing is apart from number two where Mike is Mike's replaced and Jody isn't in it at all.

23:07 Adam You have the same cast.

23:09 Chris Yes, all of them.

23:10 Adam And again, that's a real rarity with like a horror franchise where you've got.

23:15 Adam You know, pretty much everyone's come back and well, everyone's come back and no one's been canceled as far as I'm aware, so it's like, you know.

23:24 Adam I think it's pretty good going as in terms of like.

23:28 Adam Like a sort of production to be that consistent.

23:32 Adam But also.

23:33 Chris And what were the budgets like?

23:34 Adam It's so woefully mad.

23:37 Adam Yeah.

23:38 Adam You you're not building a mythology, you're obscuring a mythology.

23:40 Adam That's what you're doing.

23:42 Adam You're you're just getting this weirder and fucking weirder, guys.

23:45 Adam I love you for it, you know, so.

23:50 Adam So,

23:51 Chris So it doesn't get explained to a point of normalcy even by the end of of the fifth.

23:57 Adam No, no.

23:58 Adam It's it basically.

23:59 Adam I mean, you you get interesting things in there.

24:02 Adam You find out that you find out there's someone who looked like the tall man.

24:06 Adam Who might have created a dimensional gate and then possibly that became the template for the infraction of the alien entity that inhabits the tall man.

24:12 Adam Yeah, it's.

24:14 Chris Okay.

24:15 Adam I mean, I love it because I'm it's the sort of it's it's mad.

24:22 Adam But has a mythology, but it's one that you can barely grasp.

24:26 Adam And I really like that.

24:28 Adam I just sort of think it's just.

24:30 Adam Yeah, it just it just does it for me.

24:31 Adam I mean, that the the lovely thing I think with it as well is you've got this going back to the original.

24:37 Adam Is that mausoleum, I think they go in later films, they go and film at real mausoleums and everything.

24:44 Adam And it just doesn't have the look of that.

24:48 Adam I mean, it's clearly bubble paper on cardboard, you know.

24:53 Adam It's not.

24:54 Adam Amazing, but it's got it's it's really got a look to it and a style to it.

25:00 Adam And it's it's genuinely gothic, but not in the sort of castles and rampart sort of way.

25:04 Adam It's just that what it presents of itself.

25:09 Adam And I mean, the tall man is a tall blow, it's a 6'4 man in lifts in a tight suit.

25:15 Adam It's like, you know what I mean, it's not but somehow it's the fucking best look for this.

25:21 Adam Yeah, and the and I think the effects work really holds up.

25:25 Adam I mean, the spheres look great.

25:26 Lee They do look fantastic, yeah, yeah.

25:30 Adam And I mean that was that was like, obviously some of it's wires.

25:35 Adam And even on the Blu-ray, you can't really see where it's wire shots and stuff like that.

25:40 Adam But also one of the crew was a baseball pitcher, so they used to just get him to throw it, yeah, like stunt spheres past the camera and then they'd reverse it.

25:45 Adam That's how they do all those like the thing zooming down the corridor.

25:49 Adam It's literally that basic, it's a guy throwing it.

25:52 Adam Because it's like Don Coscarelli's third film and he's like about 22 or whatever when they started making it.

26:02 Adam And they filmed it over two years, but it's a genuinely independent production.

26:05 Adam Like his dad's stomped up some of the money.

26:09 Adam His mom is credited under pseudonyms throughout the cast throughout the credits list, because they didn't want the name Coscarelli appearing so many times in the, you know, like Garth Morringy, music by Garth Morringy.

26:22 Adam You know.

26:22 Adam And because his mom was doing visual effects and costumes and makeup and stuff like that and.

26:27 Adam You know, there's there's a lot, there's a lot going on in it.

26:32 Adam And and it's but it's fiercely its own thing, they basically managed to get it distributed.

26:38 Lee Unbelievable.

26:39 Adam That was it, I think.

26:41 Adam Yeah, because Don Coscarelli had done two films, but they were like coming of age films.

26:46 Adam And like Reggie's in both of them, and

26:50 Adam Michael Baldwin is a a secondary character in in one of them, and that's where he spotted him and was like, he's a good actor, we'll get him in.

27:00 Adam And but yeah, it's sort of he he comes into it and yeah.

27:09 Adam Basically, there's a bit I think there's a bit in one of the films that set at Halloween and they did a jump scare and that was like, he just he was sitting in the cinema and everyone jumped and it was like, I think I'll do a horror film next.

27:20 Chris Yeah.

27:21 Adam I like this feeling, you know, of everyone sort of reacting like that, so, yeah, that's.

27:25 Chris That's good.

27:25 Chris And the the the gore from the sphere, that seemed quite excessive, the amount of blood they sprayed out.

27:33 Chris In 79, was that unusual at that point?

27:35 Adam It's 79.

27:35 Adam Yeah, I think they got they I think they wanted an R-rated and they nearly got an X, but they just, I think they basically just told them that they'd cut more of the blood out.

27:45 Adam And didn't, I think that was basically it.

27:48 Adam But, but actually they got more in trouble because obviously the guy who gets attacked with the sphere then wets himself.

27:54 Lee Yes.

27:55 Adam He's literally piss slooshing across the floor and you're like, and apparently, that was a bit much for the censors.

28:00 Adam That was like, we might have gone a bit far here.

28:02 Adam So it gets all.

28:03 Adam Because watching it on Blu-ray, it's the first time I've ever been actually able to tell it's piss.

28:07 Adam Because it's just so washed out on on video prints and stuff like that, you know.

28:14 Lee Go, yeah, see.

28:15 Lee That's you this that's when I used to watch this film a lot, I so say how long ago it was.

28:22 Lee Obviously, there was the big battle between VHS and Betamax, and we had both of those.

28:29 Lee But we also had a machine called a V2000, which was like a great big.

28:33 Adam Oh, like giant video cassettes, isn't it?

28:36 Lee Yeah.

28:37 Lee With like a pull down head and you could record on both sides of them.

28:41 Lee Yes, and we had Phantasm on that.

28:44 Lee that had been ripped from a VHS from a video shop, yeah.

28:48 Lee And I used to watch it over and over again as a kid.

28:50 Lee and I don't and that's the thing, I like I remember as a kid, you just watch it and take it all in and go.

28:55 Lee And it's only then I hadn't seen it for probably 15 years, and then watched it again, I think it might have been when you gave me the box set, Adam.

29:02 Lee And I watched it again, I went, oh, yeah, no, this doesn't make any sense.

29:05 Lee I'm not on the storyline, the storyline.

29:09 Adam I I think that's to its favor in a weird way, because also it does mean that you forget bits of it.

29:14 Lee Yes.

29:15 Chris Oh, I haven't watched that. Yeah.

29:17 Adam Yeah, it's not, it's not sort of, this event leads to this event and this event leads to this event.

29:22 Lee I'd forgotten all about the the the two girls with the antique shop and all.

29:25 Lee Like all of that I completely forgotten.

29:28 Adam Because I think most of it, most of it's like sort of friends of Don Coscarelli, hardly anyone in this has gone on, Reggie Bannister is the only one who's gone on to have a film career.

29:38 Lee Yeah.

29:38 Adam because he does a lot of horror films and stuff like that, but he always comes back.

29:42 Adam Because that's the weird thing as well, Reggie, this is probably the thing you least expect, Reggie becomes the main focus of the films.

29:50 Adam In a sort of almost Jack Burton way, where he's not quite, he's not quite an action hero, but he's doing his best.

30:00 Adam And and it weirdly enough, again, like the sort of idea of tracking it through the the series of how movies changed.

30:05 Adam It becomes so full of guns and equipment and things like that, and like Reggie ends up with like a double double barrel shotgun.

30:15 Adam So it's four sawn off four barrels and that becomes his signature weapon.

30:20 Adam And you know, and weirdly enough, I think it's sort of yeah.

30:26 Adam This is an odd because it becomes like a basically they become like a road movie.

30:32 Adam They decide to chase the tall man down.

30:36 Adam That that's kind of.

30:37 Chris yeah.

30:38 Adam Yeah.

30:38 Adam That that's kind of the the literal through arc.

30:40 Adam Is that the tall man is going from town to town doing this.

30:44 Adam yeah.

30:45 Adam And they decide to follow him.

30:47 Adam And basically it's also this really lovely, brings it a really lovely creepy Western thing to it, because I'm you're beginning to get the feeling that Don Coscarelli loves a Western, especially after Bubba Ho-Tep.

30:56 Adam But, you know, watching these, they they have that because there's lots of ghost towns.

31:00 Adam Because they go to places where the tall man's been and he just it just rips the heart out of the place.

31:05 Adam And it's just a ghost town and there's no one left there, but the graves are fucking wide open.

31:10 Adam And you know.

31:12 Adam And but so they become like.

31:14 Adam The sort of occult A-team.

31:19 Adam Is like Reggie.

31:20 Lee I want to watch the rest of these now.

31:21 Adam Reggie buys out sort of like drive around.

31:25 Adam And by the way, the other thing that I will say, which is so fucking good is because it it has a through plot.

31:32 Adam And you can watch them all as a thing.

31:35 Adam But if there's a character that you didn't think was working or there's a character that you're like, oh, that's it.

31:42 Adam Don't worry, they're gone by the next film, which usually without explanation or finished off extremely quickly.

31:49 Adam And then they just crack on.

31:52 Adam And it's almost like, no, but again, it's a lovely thing of.

31:56 Adam No one's sitting there, you know, Don Coscarelli wasn't obviously going, well, what if the what when are the fans?

32:02 Adam You know.

32:03 Adam It's pre-internet.

32:03 Adam So it's going to be, you know, the fans aren't going to be happy that Tim, the gunslinging.

32:08 Adam 10 year old isn't in this one.

32:13 Adam And it's like, no, you're not going to have, well, what happened to this person?

32:16 Adam They don't care.

32:17 Adam I love that for that.

32:18 Adam It's almost like, no, just go with it for fuck sake.

32:21 Adam If you haven't gone with this after the first maybe, you know, it's it's not for you.

32:26 Lee Yeah.

32:27 Adam But yeah, they they sort of go on this sort of mission.

32:28 Adam They're like sort of and like they pick up people along the way.

32:32 Adam And Reggie becomes this sort of almost Mad Max figure.

32:36 Adam But all the time they keep fucking around with you and going, but is this real, is this reality the last the the final film Ravager.

32:44 Adam Really plays with that where it's like.

32:47 Adam Is it the because the whole thing becomes that the tall man is essentially the tall man can fuck with reality.

32:52 Adam And so he can fuck with your perception so you think things are happening that are not.

32:54 Adam Or whatever like that.

32:56 Adam Which brings me back to the fact that.

32:58 Adam Some people have spaffed into Angus Scrimm because you know.

33:02 Adam Obviously if he is the is the lady in just a projection.

33:05 Adam But she comes back as well.

33:06 Adam So yeah, so that's good.

33:08 Adam

33:10 Adam But yeah, by by then they're sort of like, well, is this the is reality reality?

33:16 Adam Is are you hopping through reality, are you dreaming this bit, oh.

33:22 Adam By the way, this might be, this might be a complete fever dream that you're completely having to ignore it.

33:27 Adam Because reality's got so horrible you're rejecting it.

33:31 Adam And you're like,

33:31 Adam What the, you know.

33:34 Adam It it's it's entertaining.

33:36 Lee It's heavy stuff.

33:37 Adam It's heavy stuff.

33:37 Adam It's sort of but but always remains fun.

33:41 Adam And and basically Reggie Bannister spends his whole time getting more fancyman's legal.

33:46 Lee Extra.

33:46 Lee Yeah, right.

33:47 Lee That's it, I'm definitely going to work my way through those.

33:49 Chris And I is there a plan for doing another one?

33:52 Adam Well, I would say, have a if if Lee, if if you start watching through them.

33:58 Adam Because weirdly enough, I I don't know which of the which of the other four.

34:04 Adam Would be the best.

34:05 Adam Because I don't think working through.

34:06 Adam I mean, maybe we work our way through them, maybe they become like a thing where we can define it.

34:09 Adam That this is like, right, here we've done the very start of 80s rental.

34:17 Adam And then by 88 you've got to, oh, here we've got to.

34:21 Adam Oh, yeah, you can make money off horror films on video, we'll bung a bit more money towards you.

34:27 Adam But, you know.

34:28 Adam And so, yeah, they they sort of work in that sense.

34:30 Adam But yeah.

34:31 Adam Let let me know how you get on with them, like, cuz it's like.

34:34 Adam And and.

34:34 Adam It has to be said.

34:36 Adam Like I said.

34:37 Adam It just gets weird that Mike.

34:39 Adam Basically Mike comes back but ends up having his own like sort of psychedelic battle of minds Western in the desert.

34:46 Adam While Reggie's going around trying to shoot the little Jawa men.

34:49 Adam You know.

34:50 Lee Do you know, this has given for some reason, when I was watching this today, it made me think of what we should cover next.

34:55 Lee Because I know we haven't planned anything, and what you're saying now has definitely made me think.

34:59 Lee that what I was thinking was right.

35:02 Lee So, how about we cover House 2, because I know we kept talking about it.

35:09 Lee Adam's little face lit up at that.

35:12 Adam No, we need to cover House 2 because I just I I need happiness.

35:16 Lee Yes.

35:17 Adam House 2's just a fucking giggle.

35:20 Lee It really is.

35:20 Lee It's one of the most mental sequels to a a proper horror film.

35:25 Lee Part one, proper horror.

35:27 Lee Part two, absolute lunacy musical.

35:30 Lee I don't know what's going.

35:30 Lee It's amazing.

35:32 Lee So, yes.

35:33 Adam Because obviously and we and we have covered House.

35:35 Lee We have.

35:35 Lee Yes.

35:36 Lee So I know Chris has seen it.

35:37 Lee So I know we're all good to go.

35:39 Chris It was it was proper horror, but it was quirky proper horror.

35:44 Adam Yeah, there was the one where Vietnam lived in his cupboards basically.

35:46 Lee Yeah.

35:49 Lee Oh, if you think what's in his cupboard's bad, wait until you find out what's beyond his sideboard.

35:54 Lee Right.

35:55 Lee So.

35:56 Lee That's it, we'll wrap up there.

35:58 Lee Thanks ever so much for listening, everybody, go and check out Phantasm.

36:01 Lee If you like me, Adam has sold you on the entire rest of the series, I can't wait to work through them.

36:06 Adam Seriously, I I went through it through a week and and I'll admit in in every in in a lot of ways, not a particularly fantastic week.

36:14 Adam But I stuck with it and yeah.

36:17 Adam And it's it's weird because it's very disjointed, but also really consistent.

36:22 Adam And I.

36:24 Adam No, I just love that.

36:25 Adam It's the same as like, oh, you you see that guy in the caf.

36:28 Adam Yeah, he was in three seasons ago, he was a cafe owner, he was he owned the cafe in that episode.

36:32 Adam They've got the same bloke back.

36:33 Adam I'm almost like that.

36:34 Adam It's like.

36:35 Adam Oh well, you know, you've got all the you've got all the people here, but fuck me if you've really deviated from where this was.

36:40 Lee Right.

36:40 Lee So, yes, go and check that out.

36:43 Lee Go and check out House 2 and we'll be back to discuss that in a fortnight.

36:47 Lee Thanks ever so much for listening.

36:49 Lee Good night.

36:50 Chris Good night.

36:51 Adam Good night.