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Re: Phantasm V
Was reading retro reviews for the cynical Omen III when I seen this...
Loved the Tall Man concept despite the jump the shark rubbish sequels. This however looks awful, they really should have just made a big budget reboot with a decent director. This was actually a series that could've used a remake.
Re: Phantasm V
I JUST found out about this. I am a HUGE Phantasm fan.
My head 'bout exploded when I found out they were PHINALLY doing a fifth film.
However...
After I saw that trailer, as stoked as I was, I definitely have my reservations. It certainly doesn't look any cheaper than anything that shows up up Direct-To-Netflix these days. And if they director and cast stay close to the source material, it sounds good.
I'm just hoping it's a worth finale to the franchise, rather than Phantasm's -- "Highlander V: The Source". Bleh.
Re: Phantasm V
My personal opinions on the franchise, is that the original is a classic, and to this day underrated. Rarely is it spoken of in the same breath as Halloween or Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Friday The 13th or some of these low-budget affairs from the same time frame. Phantasm to this day is haunting and still holds up.
Phantasm II is the one that so many fans adore. It's purely a spectacle. It tries to be the Aliens-to-Alien, this pumped up, bigger and badder sequel with more guns, more 'Cuda, more explosions, more more more. Yes in alot of ways PII is the original Phantasm on PED's/Steroids. But like most juicing baseball hitters, sure the home run swings are big and magnificient, but somewhere the heart is lost and the second film is no exception. Everything is bigger and badder, but the feel of the first film and that wonderful atmosphere is lost, ala T1 to T2.
Phantasm III is a total piss-take. I don't know if Coscarelli just got bored, or had pressure from Universal to make it whatever they asked for because it was going DTV in 1993/94 and they needed it to be alot of things to mass-market back then... I dunno. Either way what happens is an unever, busy, bizarre, campy-version of the series that in some ways plays like a comedy. Granted the first is kind of a Jody & Mike-story, and the second is a Mike & Liz story. The third is strictly a Reggie-story, and because of Reggie's character, Reggie is a tongue-in-cheek anti-hero. So maybe because of Reggie being the star, it was intentional to make it somewhat campy like the Reggie character. Still the film didn't have to come across as something bound for USA Up All Night with Gilbert Gottfried. It's average at best, and if I were Coscarelli I wouldn't brag about directing it.
Phantasm IV: Oblivion, which is almost universally hated (which I don't understand), was the major rebound-film for me of the franchise. Despite the fan-fare around the second film, Phantasm IV for me is easily the best of the sequels. Purely a Tall Man-story, despite a shoestring budget the film is a bizarre "what is reality?", "Dream within a dream" world attempts to have a Tall Man-origin story. Despite tons of stock footage from the original Phantasm, plus deleted scenes, returning to pad the film, what results in an interesting sequel that after 20 years restores the original darkness, and creepy atmosphere from the first film. Of all of the sequels, Phantasm IV actually feels like it's in the same world as the first. Unfortunately the end result falls short, as the budget seems too low to full flesh out the plot arc's, and the idea is kind of half-baked. Still for me it was very intesting to watch, laid some fascinating concepts, and might be the Halloween III of the franchise for me.
And with that said, Phantasm is like Atari said, one of those franchises in desperate need to rebooted. There actually were plans with Coscarelli to finalize a deal in the mid-2000s to produce a reboot trilogy with New Line Cinema. New Line wanted to fund a fantasy/horror franchise with a huge budget on the same level as Lord of the Rings for fantasy/sci-fi. Could you imagine Phantasm with such a budget? Well the original plan was to bring this to life with a rebooted story that would feature a new director (not Coscarelli), but Coscarelli on board as writer/producer. Reggie Bannister was to reprise an older version of Reggie in the original story, and Angus Scrimm would play an older version of the Tall Man, but it would still be like starting from scratch with an all-new trilogy.
Phans, like me, geeked the fuck out. Well Coscarelli spoke too soon about it, before the contracts were signed, and the plans were canceled for whatever reason. But the fact remains that Phantasm, to this day, has THE MOST BRILLIANT concept for any horror film that i've seen.
The philosophical ramifications of the "what is reality", "dream within a dream", mixed with horror/sci-fi/fantasy/action-elements could've been one of the deepest, richest worlds in horror that were ever seen. In the right hands, the concept could've been LOTR or Star Wars for horror films.
Instead... I dunno. It just didn't happen. The films remain cult fan favorites, and I will be first in line for Phantasm V as I was first in line in high school when Phantasm IV came out. More than likely P5 will be a Direct-to-Netflix release, but still I will be there ready to love it.
Sadly Phantasm's legacy will always be that of "what could've been". Still hope a die-hard fan one day comes into a shitload of money and bank rolls a big Hollywood reboot of it. It still has a concept waiting to be fully explored. Phantasm has yet to be fully realized.
It's never over...
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Re: Phantasm V
I bought the collection a few years ago after someone here recommended it (you?). Can't say I ever got into it. I don't know, it had this extreme b movie thing about it, I struggled to take it seriously. Couldn't really get through the first film and it's been laying on the shelf since.
That being said I thought the movie had something, a potential, so I'd be all for a better crafted reboot.
Re: Phantasm V
I think the film itself as a concept is smarter than even Coscarelli himself could write it. I think of Phantasm in the sense of, what if the film had tackled Jung's dark archetypes and dream analysis theories, but pushed it beyond just the easy cop out of hell or purgatory like so many others. The possibilities are endless, now.
Maybe with all the explosion of comic-themed TV series lately... Phantasm might work better as a weekly series that brings you back each with, with new situations, new dreams, new discoveries, more questions and hypotheticals for the audience to ponder, all the while discovering more about the Tall Man, and the overall series being the hunt to bring him down.
Sounds like a better concept for something like this, rather than trying to do a 2-hour reboot movie. The base concept is just too deep to pack into a cheap B-movie. The source material deserves ALOT more than it got.
Re: Phantasm V
Supposedly this was finished, including cutting/special effects. However they haven't got a distributor at the minute 
.
Re: Phantasm V
I need to dive into this series again. I don't think I've watched any of these since the 90s. II was pretty damn good but Axlin totally nails it in his description. Also made a good point on how the concept might have been too far ahead of its creators. I had never really looked that deep into it but he's right.
I'd imagine for younger fans like atari, Polluxlm, etc. it would come across as extremely dated. Probably would for me as well when watching it again. I used to think The Boogens was all that and a bag of chips but when watching it a few years ago it was a shit sandwich.
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