Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead

Dir: Don Coscarelli

1994

***

After Phantasm II received little success with a mainstream audience, Universal Studios relaxed their pressure on Don Coscarelli to make any more and it looked as if the series was done. However, Universal did tell Coscarelli that, while they where unwilling to theatrically distribute any further, should he and his associates decide to make another (paying for it themselves) they would be prepared to distribute it straight to VHS. After a few years, and realising he’d have full creative output again, Coscarelli wrote a third installment, and offered the role of Mike to his original performer, A. Michael Baldwin, who returned to the role after almost 16 years. Phantasm III was one of the top 100 highest selling direct-to-video titles of 1994 and the hard-core fans, of which there were many, were very happy indeed. From this point on, the Phantasm films were for fans of the original only, there was no compromise, you either followed Coscarelli down the rabbit hole or you watched something entirely different. While I did follow Coscarelli down the rabbit hole (and will continue to do so), I can’t help but think his talents could be put to better use elsewhere, as Bubba Ho-Tep and John Dies At The End have since proven. However, I’m locked in, Reggie isn’t and never will be the next Ash (Evil Dead) but the Phantasm films are so unique and so odd, that I can’t help but get into them. The film starts exactly where the last film ends (even though it was finished six years before). Immediately after his apparent demise at the end of Phantasm II, a new Tall Man (still played by Angus Scrimm) emerges from a dimensional portal. At the same time, the hearse that carries Liz and Mike explodes. Reggie finds Liz dead but saves Mike from the Tall Man by threatening to kill them all with a grenade. The Tall Man retreats with Liz's head and threatens to return for Mike when he's well again. After Mike spends two years comatose in the hospital, he has a near death experience in which his dead brother Jody and the Tall Man appear. As he wakes from his coma, he is attacked by a demonic nurse but quickly subdues her. Reggie arrives as she dies, her scalp bursting open to reveal a sphere which takes off through the window after it approaches Mike. Back at home, the Tall Man arrives via dimensional fork, fights off Reggie, transforms Jody into a charred sphere, and draws Mike through the gate with him. The next morning, Reggie (with the Jody-sphere) travels to a deserted town and is captured by three looters, who lock him in the trunk of the Hemi-'Cuda. Reggie is rescued by a young boy named Tim, who kills the looters when they break into his house. After they have buried the looters in the yard, Tim tells Reggie how the Tall Man took his parents and destroyed the town. In the morning, Reggie and Tim find the three graves empty and their hearse gone. Reggie tries to leave Tim with an orphanage, but the boy hides in Reggie's car. Reggie enters a mausoleum and is confronted by a sphere, but he is subdued by two young women, Tanesha and Rocky, before he can destroy it. Reggie tries to warn them, but Tanesha is killed by the sphere. Tim appears and destroys it with his pistol. The three join forces, come upon a convoy of hearses driven by Gravers, and decide to follow them. At night, Jody appears to Reggie in a dream and takes him to the Tall Man's lair, where they rescue Mike. As Reggie wakes, Jody opens a portal and Mike emerges. The Tall Man tries to follow, but Reggie closes the portal, leaving the Tall Man's hands behind. After fighting off the Tall Man's minions, including the undead looters, they enter a large mortuary. Inside, they find a cryonics facility, and Mike remembers that the Tall Man dislikes cold. While Reggie, Rocky, and Tim are separated and attacked by the looters, Mike consults with the Jody-sphere, who explains that the Tall Man is amassing an army to conquer dimensions: brains are harvested to turn into the killer spheres, and the bodies are shrunken and turned into drones. The Tall Man senses their presence, captures Mike, and straps him onto a table. Two of the looters wheel in Tim. Mike tries to give a message to Tim, warning him that "there are thousands of them", but Mike is paralyzed by the Tall Man. Meanwhile, Rocky defeats her attacker and helps Reggie. Cut free by the Jody-sphere, Tim runs into the remaining looters, who are killed by the Jody-sphere and Reggie's 4-barrel shotgun. The trio crash into the embalming room, where the Tall Man is operating on Mike. Rocky impales the Tall Man with a spear dipped in liquid nitrogen, and they lock him in the refrigerator room. However, a golden sphere breaks out of his head and attacks them; Reggie catches it in a plunger and, with some help, manages to dump it into the nitrogen tank. Mike finds a golden sphere in his own head, and his eyes turn silver. Complaining of the cold, he leaves with Jody and warns Reggie to stay away. Reggie suggests exploring the mortuary, but Rocky declines and leaves too. Tim reports that Mike tried to warn him, but they find out too late that there are dozens of spheres left, and Reggie is pinned to the wall by them. As Tim is about to destroy the spheres by his pistol, a new Tall Man reappears, says "It's never over" and watches as Tim is pulled through a window by a creature. Dream Sequences, surrealism, abstract fantasy and A. Michael Baldwin. The franchise is back where it belongs. I don’t think its as strong as the previous films but it was nice revisiting old friends and seeing, A. Michael Baldwin, Reggie Bannister, Bill Thornbury and Angus Scrimm reunited once again in the same scene after fifteen years. Coscarelli has always been his own uniquely creative force but you can tell he started reading the works of Joe R. Lansdale when writing this particular script. The money the saved by re-using the same score from the previous film allowed them to use digital effects for the first time in a Phantasm – an exciting move I’m sure in 1994 but my goodness does it age the film now. Thankfully they still used some old-school special effects for some of the bloodier scenes. Ridiculous and so convoluted it’ll give even Star Trek nerds a headache but you either love it, hate it or have become so transfixed and numbed by its strangeness that you haven’t made up your mind yet but will keep watching anyway.