31 days of horror Year 3 day 25

Phantasm
1979
MGM DVD

Back sometime in the mid 80’s , while working my way through the local video store’s horror section I discovered Phantasm. I had never heard of the film, but it quickly became one of my favorite horror films. So I was super excited when I heard that MGM was releasing it . Then word got out that it was gonna be loaded down with extras. On the day of release I went on my lunch break to go buy it. And watched it 2 times that day at work.

The film is about 2 brothers and their best friend. Mike is the younger brother . His parents died a few years earlier so his older brother Jody is taking care of him. But Mike gets the feeling that Jody will be leaving soon. So Mike follows Jody where ever he goes. Well one day after following Jody and their friend Reggie to a funeral, Mike sees the funeral director lifting up a coffin by himself. Mike tries to tell his brother about this but Jody just blows him off. So Mike breaks into the funeral home late one night and discovers that the funeral director, The Tall Man played by Angus Scrimm, is using the dead bodies to create this creature that looks kind of like  a Jawa from Star Wars.

Mike finally convinces both Jody and Reggie that something is strange up at the funeral home. All three of them go to the funeral home and find a warp gate. It seems that the Tall Man is an alien who is sending these Jawa like dwarfs off to another planet. They get found by Angus and the rest of the film is him chasing them. And the trio trying to figure out how to kill off the Tall Man.

This movie has a style of it’s own. It feels like someone filmed a nightmare. But it isn’t like the various David Lynch films that have the same feeling. Mainly cause after one viewing you can pretty much understand what is going on in Phantasm. Unlike Lynch films that require multiple viewing to understand what is happening. Now the DVD like I said before is loaded down with extras. We get a great commentary with the three main guys plus the director. About 10 minutes of deleted scenes. A interview with the director and Angus that is from 1979. The original trailer plus a bunch of radio and TV spots. A few years ago Anchor Bay re-released the film. The only real difference between the two releases is the MGM one isn’t anamorphic and the Anchor Bay one is. Phantasm gets a A.