WEBVTT - Weirdhouse Cinema Rewind: Phantasm 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:08.080 Hey, Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. Rewind. My name 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:11.280 is Joe McCormick, and the ball is back because today 0:00:11.320 --> 0:00:14.560 we are bringing you an older episode of Weird House Cinema. 0:00:14.560 --> 0:00:18.400 It's the one we did on Fantasm. This originally published 0:00:18.440 --> 0:00:22.200 September thirtieth, twenty twenty two. Let's get right in. 0:00:25.560 --> 0:00:31.280 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:35.440 --> 0:00:39.080 Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob Lamb. 0:00:39.040 --> 0:00:41.760 And this is Joe McCormick. And as we enter the 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:45.040 Halloween season on Weird House Cinema, one of our favorite 0:00:45.080 --> 0:00:46.920 times of the year. Why would I even say one 0:00:47.000 --> 0:00:49.639 of clearly our favorite time of the year. We are 0:00:49.680 --> 0:00:53.040 going to be doing a series of horror movies on 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:56.680 Weird House this month, and we're kicking it off today 0:00:57.080 --> 0:01:01.960 with Fantasm. I first saw this movie V projected onto 0:01:02.040 --> 0:01:05.720 a wall when I was in college. I had absolutely 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:08.520 no knowledge whatsoever about it going in. I just knew 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:11.240 they're showing a horror movie projecting it on a wall. 0:01:11.319 --> 0:01:13.360 I gotta go see it. And I think it was 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:17.240 about the time we got to Reggie Banister in his 0:01:17.440 --> 0:01:21.000 ice cream Man outfit that I started to really wonder 0:01:21.040 --> 0:01:24.520 what I had gotten myself into. By the end, I 0:01:24.640 --> 0:01:28.600 was totally amazed. I was, in fact agog and I 0:01:28.800 --> 0:01:30.760 could not tell you if what I had just watched 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:34.000 was a good movie or a bad movie, but either way, 0:01:34.040 --> 0:01:35.040 I was transfixed. 0:01:35.480 --> 0:01:38.800 Yes, it is a film that tranfixes one. It's a 0:01:38.800 --> 0:01:44.480 film that hypnotizes you. And yeah, I think I you know, 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:46.040 I have our time remembering when I saw this one 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:48.400 for the first time, because I think I saw Phantasm 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:51.680 two first. I think I saw it on Joe Bob 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:54.880 Briggs Monster Vision on TNT back in the day. I 0:01:54.880 --> 0:01:58.160 think they would show this film quite a lot and that. 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:00.080 But at that point I was hooked. And then I 0:02:00.120 --> 0:02:04.040 started picking up these other Fantasm films, renting them and 0:02:04.080 --> 0:02:08.480 so forth. But yeah, this is nineteen seventy nine's Fantasm 0:02:08.520 --> 0:02:11.800 we're going to be discussing. This is definitely a film 0:02:12.360 --> 0:02:14.799 with a dream like quality to it. It's really it's 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:16.400 one we've kind of had in the back pocket for 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:21.079 a while because it is a quintessential psychotronic film. It 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:24.080 just all the boxes check off on this one. 0:02:24.400 --> 0:02:26.720 I would say that it is more than just a 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:30.079 dreamlike quality. So you might compare it to the films 0:02:30.080 --> 0:02:33.480 of Luccio Fulci, or is that you know, this Italian 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:38.320 filmmaker who made strange, kind of beautiful but gross horror 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:42.360 films that often many scenes feel like a dream because 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:44.680 you're like, wait, why are we here? How did we 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:47.280 get here? Why is the person doing that? There's a 0:02:47.360 --> 0:02:51.799 kind of dream logic connecting everything. Phantasm does have that, 0:02:52.120 --> 0:02:54.080 but I would say it goes a step farther in that. 0:02:54.320 --> 0:02:59.200 Unlike full Chise films, Phantasm is literally a recursive series 0:02:59.240 --> 0:03:01.799 of dreams as best I can tell, I mean, who 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:04.600 who knows? Like there are at least four times in 0:03:04.639 --> 0:03:07.600 the movie where a character appears to wake up from 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:10.679 a dream. It is not clear when the dream started 0:03:10.880 --> 0:03:14.440 or when the dream ended. What's a dream and what's reality? 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:18.160 Yeah? Yeah, I think that's a good way of putting it. Now. 0:03:18.360 --> 0:03:20.520 I want to also note from the get go here 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:22.480 that this is a film with a both a devoted 0:03:22.520 --> 0:03:26.440 following and multiple sequels that build on its lore to 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:29.880 varying degrees. We're mostly just going to be focusing on 0:03:29.960 --> 0:03:32.840 the first film on nineteen seventy nine is Fantasm. I'm 0:03:32.880 --> 0:03:34.880 going to bring up the sequel a little bit, But 0:03:35.800 --> 0:03:38.280 for the most part, I haven't seen the other Phantasm 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:41.280 films in a long while, and I haven't seen the 0:03:41.320 --> 0:03:45.080 final entry in the series twenty sixteens Phantasm Ravager at all. 0:03:45.720 --> 0:03:49.200 So yeah, we're mostly going to be discussing Fantasm from 0:03:49.200 --> 0:03:50.960 seventy nine on its own terms. 0:03:51.360 --> 0:03:53.800 I have not seen any of the sequels. If this 0:03:53.880 --> 0:03:57.119 were years ago, I might try to mount an attempt 0:03:57.120 --> 0:03:59.000 to watch them all, kind of like I did when 0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:01.320 I was like, oh, this is the year I watch 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:04.280 all the hell Raiser movies. That was a good use 0:04:04.320 --> 0:04:07.920 of my time. But I don't know if I'm going 0:04:08.000 --> 0:04:09.520 to make it now. I don't know if I will 0:04:09.560 --> 0:04:10.480 get past P two. 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:13.280 Yeah. P two is a good stopping play, so I'll 0:04:13.280 --> 0:04:16.840 discuss P two in a little bit. I think that 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:20.960 they're both very different films, and they're both very very fun, 0:04:21.000 --> 0:04:24.400 and they're in different ways. But coming back to seventy 0:04:24.480 --> 0:04:27.440 nine's Fantasm, let's hit the elevator pitch on this one. 0:04:27.560 --> 0:04:31.960 I'd like to paraphrase the words of one Shack by saying, 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:36.480 you can summarize this one as flying balls, dwarves just weird. 0:04:36.920 --> 0:04:41.200 Phantasm does not shy away from the otherworldly imagery, probably 0:04:41.240 --> 0:04:43.920 the most iconic of which is the first thing you mentioned, 0:04:44.040 --> 0:04:49.080 the flying ball. In a way, what Jason's hockey mask 0:04:49.360 --> 0:04:52.440 is to the Friday the Thirteenth series, I believe the 0:04:52.520 --> 0:04:55.920 ball is to the Phantasm series in that it is 0:04:55.960 --> 0:04:58.880 not really the human villain, but it is like the 0:04:59.000 --> 0:05:02.000 symbol of the villain's power, right. 0:05:02.080 --> 0:05:04.160 And also it is something just in terms of like 0:05:04.279 --> 0:05:08.440 elements of the film that cannot just be passively copied 0:05:08.440 --> 0:05:11.440 by another film. Like if you have a character, a killer, 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:14.360 especially in another movie, put on a hockey mask, well 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:17.040 you just cross the line. You're in Jason's territory now, 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:21.200 and not necessarily mean that from a legal standpoint, but 0:05:21.240 --> 0:05:25.400 from just a creative standpoint, like you are now clearly 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:28.200 in the shadow of Jason. You may have already been 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:31.280 in the shadow, but now you've stepped entirely within the 0:05:31.480 --> 0:05:35.960 umbral shade there. Likewise, with this film, yeah, flying silver 0:05:36.040 --> 0:05:38.240 balls of Death. You can't just have a flying silver 0:05:38.320 --> 0:05:40.680 ball of death in your film or your story or 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:44.960 what have you without clearly saying yes, I come in 0:05:45.000 --> 0:05:46.000 the wake of Phantasm. 0:05:46.320 --> 0:05:49.080 Before you even understand the context of the ball, we 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:51.760 should describe what the ball is. It's a metal ball. 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:55.600 It flies through the air, flies at your face, It 0:05:55.640 --> 0:05:58.680 attaches itself to your forehead via a couple of little 0:05:58.920 --> 0:06:01.800 hooks I guess, then get in your head, and then 0:06:01.839 --> 0:06:04.799 it drills into your head and then drains your body 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:07.520 entirely of blood in a jet that shoots out the 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:08.400 back of the ball. 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:11.680 Yeah. And they're so great because and I love just 0:06:11.720 --> 0:06:15.600 thinking about what makes them great, because they're and again 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:21.280 largely keeping things relegated to the original film here, they 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:25.480 seem to be machines. They are pieces of technology. They're 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:28.120 very good at what they do, but they can be evaded, 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:31.400 they can be to certain degrees outsmarted. And then there's 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:35.200 also something about the way they function that feels not 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:39.799 only alien in origin, but also maybe alien in function, 0:06:40.000 --> 0:06:44.000 Like it makes me think of parasitic infections where the 0:06:44.040 --> 0:06:46.440 parasite goes awry because it's not supposed to be in 0:06:46.480 --> 0:06:48.479 a human body and it's not supposed to wind up 0:06:48.520 --> 0:06:51.159 in the brain. Like you almost feel like this is 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:53.839 a machine that was made to interface with a different 0:06:54.160 --> 0:06:58.240 biological form, and what we're seeing here is it executing 0:06:58.360 --> 0:07:02.080 its purpose on a box that it wasn't designed for. 0:07:02.440 --> 0:07:05.120 That's a very good comparison. Yes, this flying metal ball 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:08.559 is sort of like the toxoplasma Gandhi of the Red 0:07:08.640 --> 0:07:12.720 planet that the aliens in this movie come from. In fact, 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:15.679 I was reading a bit of trivia about this movie, 0:07:15.720 --> 0:07:21.480 and apparently the idea for Phantasm traces back to a 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:25.000 dream that the director Don Coscarelli had when he was 0:07:25.040 --> 0:07:28.760 a teenager. He dreamed that he was running down these 0:07:29.000 --> 0:07:33.440 endless corridors, marble corridors that never stopped, and he just 0:07:33.520 --> 0:07:36.720 kept running and running because he was being chased by 0:07:36.760 --> 0:07:41.680 a chrome sphere, a floating chrome ball that wanted to 0:07:41.760 --> 0:07:46.000 penetrate his skull with a needle. And that's a pretty 0:07:46.000 --> 0:07:49.760 scary image. I am surprised how well that worked on screen. 0:07:50.400 --> 0:07:54.200 Yeah, it did, It absolutely does. All right, Well, let's 0:07:54.200 --> 0:08:06.920 go ahead and hear the trailer for Fanfasm Fantasm. 0:08:07.080 --> 0:08:25.960 Is it a nightmare? Phantasm? Is it an illusion? Phantasm? 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:29.320 Whatever it is. 0:08:34.800 --> 0:08:51.400 If this one doesn't scare you, you're already dead fantasm. 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:54.240 All right. I love this trailer, great trailer. I love 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:58.120 the line if this one doesn't scare you, you're already dead, 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:00.920 because it makes it sound like they should have another 0:09:00.960 --> 0:09:03.760 message at the end of the movie that says like, 0:09:03.800 --> 0:09:07.640 are you alive, then we're pleased to hear you enjoyed Phantasm. 0:09:08.360 --> 0:09:13.319 So we've already compared Phantasm to some Italian horror movies, 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:18.960 especially ful cheese movies, because of its dream equality and colorful, 0:09:19.040 --> 0:09:22.920 lucid imagery. But another point of comparison I would like 0:09:22.960 --> 0:09:26.679 to raise is that Phantasm kind of reminds me of 0:09:26.760 --> 0:09:32.719 the films of very low budget independent amateur filmmakers, or 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:36.280 maybe not necessarily amateur, but low budget independent filmmakers even 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:40.080 going back to the fifties, like Ed Wood and Roger Corman. 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:42.480 Of course, you know you're gonna have different levels of 0:09:43.400 --> 0:09:45.839 ability to realize one's vision in there, but it has 0:09:45.920 --> 0:09:50.800 that same scrappiness that it feels like an improvised production 0:09:51.360 --> 0:09:54.439 of young people who didn't necessarily always know what they 0:09:54.440 --> 0:09:57.560 were doing or have all the permits they needed, or 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:02.480 have the money to realize everything in the glossiest possible way. 0:10:02.800 --> 0:10:05.400 And yet it does kind of come together with an 0:10:05.440 --> 0:10:10.439 infectious enthusiasm and a kind of irresistible energy, even though 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:13.920 it kind of lacks a sense of worldliness or experience. 0:10:14.400 --> 0:10:18.880 Yeah, absolutely, it does have that scrappiness to it. So 0:10:19.320 --> 0:10:23.120 let's get into the individuals behind this scrappiness, because yes, 0:10:23.200 --> 0:10:27.400 this is a Don Cossarelli picture. Don Costarelli was born 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:30.800 in nineteen fifty four. He is the director, the writer, 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:34.120 the cinematographer, and the film editor on this movie. He 0:10:34.480 --> 0:10:37.800 was I believe twenty three years old when filming started 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:40.120 and twenty five years old when it was released, and 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:43.720 this was his third picture, following nineteen seventy five's Jim 0:10:43.840 --> 0:10:47.640 the World's Greatest in nineteen seventy six is Kinney and Company. 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:51.960 Phantasm makes so much more sense once you shared this 0:10:52.040 --> 0:10:55.599 fact with me that Coscarelli was twenty three when he 0:10:55.679 --> 0:10:59.960 started making it. It has such early twenties energy, again 0:11:00.160 --> 0:11:03.640 coming back to that lack of wisdom and worldliness, but 0:11:03.760 --> 0:11:05.840 at the same time a thing that makes up for it, 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:09.360 which is an absolutely like it is a leaky vessel 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:13.080 of the essence of fun. It's just like kind of 0:11:13.760 --> 0:11:17.360 you feel the excitement about making a movie within this. 0:11:17.440 --> 0:11:22.280 Movie, Yeah, yeah, absolutely, it's there's I think there's a 0:11:22.320 --> 0:11:25.040 lot to this film that does line up perfectly with 0:11:25.080 --> 0:11:29.600 this idea of the twenty three year old filmmaker of 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:35.600 a early twenties dreamer who's also exploring exploring some familiar topics. 0:11:36.080 --> 0:11:39.559 A lot of horror films deal with sex and death, too. 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:43.160 Many horror films probably deal with the dichotomy of sex 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:46.520 and death, but this one does so in a I thought, 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:51.600 a very fascinating way. Like you get the feeling of 0:11:51.600 --> 0:11:55.360 of of the youth standing, you know, outside of childhood 0:11:55.720 --> 0:11:59.960 but not within the adult world, confronted by the mystery 0:12:00.760 --> 0:12:05.360 of death, of sex, and and just trying to figure 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:07.760 out what these are and like what and to what 0:12:07.840 --> 0:12:10.679 extent they are threats to him, to what extent they 0:12:10.720 --> 0:12:13.360 are his destiny. We see all of that wound up 0:12:13.400 --> 0:12:17.880 in the character of Mike. Yeah, it's it's really fascinating 0:12:17.880 --> 0:12:20.760 to look back on it and really gaze long and 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:22.199 deep into the phantasm here. 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:24.440 So you mentioned that Coscarelli had made a couple of 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:28.319 movies before Phantasm that were not horror movies, though there 0:12:28.440 --> 0:12:30.959 is a there's a story that I think comes from 0:12:31.120 --> 0:12:34.280 the audio commentary track that he recorded for the movie, 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:38.040 but anyway, wherever it comes from, the story is that 0:12:38.120 --> 0:12:41.359 he got the idea to make a horror film because 0:12:42.480 --> 0:12:45.600 when he was sitting in an audience that was watching 0:12:45.600 --> 0:12:48.480 his earlier movie Kenny in Company, which I've never seen. 0:12:48.679 --> 0:12:50.200 I don't know what the deal with it is. Apparently 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:52.280 there's a jump scare moment in it, like a character 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:55.360 puts on a scary mask and jumps out, and he 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:59.080 watched the way the audience reacted to this jump scare moment, 0:12:59.160 --> 0:13:02.120 and he is just he was so into it the 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:05.000 way that they like they literally jumped from their seats 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:07.280 and screamed, and he was like, I gotta make a 0:13:07.320 --> 0:13:09.200 whole movie of this. I'm doing horror now. 0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:12.800 Yeah. I do like that he came into this after 0:13:12.840 --> 0:13:15.440 having made two non horror films that I think both 0:13:15.679 --> 0:13:16.920 I haven't seen either of them either, but I think 0:13:16.960 --> 0:13:20.040 they both revolve largely around young people in the lives 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:22.960 of young people, and then he moves on into horror. 0:13:22.960 --> 0:13:25.199 A lot of people yet jump right into the horror, 0:13:25.559 --> 0:13:28.040 and so I think that's another reason that Phantasm works 0:13:28.040 --> 0:13:32.200 so well, is that it's not just obsessed with like, 0:13:32.320 --> 0:13:34.160 let's get some gore up there on the screen, like, 0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:38.560 there is also this attention to the central youth character 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:41.360 in the film and what he's thinking and how he's 0:13:41.360 --> 0:13:42.400 processing everything. 0:13:42.880 --> 0:13:49.680 Another way that Coscarelli's vision feels as distinctly young to 0:13:49.760 --> 0:13:53.560 me is the way the movie tries to pack in 0:13:54.080 --> 0:13:57.760 a lot of elements that are not necessarily They don't 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:01.640 necessarily like fit smoothly, but he's just trying to get 0:14:01.679 --> 0:14:04.200 a lot of stuff in there. And I think part 0:14:04.200 --> 0:14:06.720 of that is also explained by another trivia fact I 0:14:06.760 --> 0:14:10.640 read about the movie, which is that he apparently at 0:14:10.640 --> 0:14:13.920 one point talked about how he remembered when he was 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:18.640 a kid, he would see ads and trailers for horror 0:14:18.679 --> 0:14:21.960 movies that would seem really exciting, but then when you 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:24.320 would go watch the actual movie, it would just be 0:14:24.440 --> 0:14:26.920 people sitting around talking for most of the movie. There 0:14:26.920 --> 0:14:29.880 were actually very few scares in them. The scares were 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:32.280 already in the trailer, and he wanted to make a 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:36.000 movie that had a scary moment at least every five minutes, 0:14:36.080 --> 0:14:39.480 that is just packed with little scares and weird things. 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:41.440 And it kind of reminds me of the story of 0:14:41.520 --> 0:14:44.240 Roger Korman telling Charles B. Griffith, Okay, when you ride 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:46.760 to Tack of the Crab Monsters, the important thing is 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:49.880 it has to have action or horror on every page. 0:14:50.360 --> 0:14:53.040 Yeah, phantasm doesn't really hold anything back, and it keeps 0:14:53.080 --> 0:14:55.600 you on your toes that way it is, and I 0:14:55.600 --> 0:14:58.440 think also builds into that dreamline quality. If things are 0:14:58.480 --> 0:15:00.960 making sense and seeming normal, how long are they going 0:15:01.000 --> 0:15:04.240 to do that? What can happen? And eventually you feel 0:15:04.240 --> 0:15:07.400 like anything can happen at any moment. Now, this film, 0:15:07.440 --> 0:15:09.840 like we said, the scrappiness of it, it was made for. 0:15:09.880 --> 0:15:12.520 I think it's been estimated for around three hundred thousand, 0:15:12.680 --> 0:15:16.440 though I think the estimation there is kind of rough 0:15:16.480 --> 0:15:20.480 because I don't think they were really keeping super accurate records. 0:15:21.200 --> 0:15:26.760 Ended up grossing millions, though with a success with audiences 0:15:26.920 --> 0:15:29.120 and some critics. I was looking back, I noticed that 0:15:29.160 --> 0:15:32.240 Ebert was not a big fan of Phantasm and liked 0:15:32.240 --> 0:15:36.320 Phantasm too even less. But Michael Weldon of the Psychotronic 0:15:36.360 --> 0:15:39.960 Film Guides, he loved it. It's one of his favorites. 0:15:40.160 --> 0:15:43.480 He celebrated it as quote a unique and fascinating horror 0:15:43.560 --> 0:15:46.720 hit with more satisfying surprises than you could find in 0:15:46.760 --> 0:15:50.000 a dozen other recent offerings. And that was written in 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:54.040 I think eighty three, So this film really established Cossarelli 0:15:54.080 --> 0:15:57.800 within the horror realm. He followed this up with nineteen 0:15:57.840 --> 0:16:01.280 eighty three's beast Master, which I think is also a 0:16:01.280 --> 0:16:03.840 pretty solid film in my opinion anyway, and certainly one 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:05.400 that has achieved cult status. 0:16:05.680 --> 0:16:09.200 He got some stars for that one, right, Who's in it? 0:16:09.520 --> 0:16:12.760 Rip Torn, Rip Horn is in it? The beast Master. 0:16:12.840 --> 0:16:14.920 They got the beast Master for it, which is id 0:16:15.080 --> 0:16:19.280 all since it's about the beast Master. What Mark Singer? Yeah, yeah, 0:16:19.680 --> 0:16:22.360 so yeah. We talked about beast Master two on a 0:16:22.400 --> 0:16:24.080 past episode of Weird House, So if you want more 0:16:24.120 --> 0:16:26.680 beast Master action, go back to that one. But again, 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:29.880 I think eighty three's beast Mastered pretty solid. 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:33.720 In Coscarelli's defense, he did not direct beast Master two. 0:16:34.040 --> 0:16:36.960 That was somebody else, right now. 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:41.080 Colgarelli did come back to direct and write Phantasm two 0:16:41.320 --> 0:16:44.640 in nineteen eighty eight, Phantasm three, Lord of the Dead 0:16:44.680 --> 0:16:49.160 in nineteen ninety four, and Phantasm four Oblivion in nineteen 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:54.200 ninety eight. His non Fantasm directional credits also include Survival 0:16:54.280 --> 0:16:57.240 Quest in eighty eight, Bubba Hotep in two thousand and two. 0:16:57.480 --> 0:17:01.400 He did a Master's of Horror episode titled Incident On 0:17:01.560 --> 0:17:04.200 and Off a Mountain Road From two thousand and five, 0:17:04.600 --> 0:17:07.600 both that and Bubba Hotep are based on Joe Lansdale stories. 0:17:08.080 --> 0:17:10.480 He did John Dies at the End in twenty twelve, 0:17:11.040 --> 0:17:14.480 and he also directed the Doo music video The Last 0:17:14.560 --> 0:17:16.280 in Line in nineteen eighty four. 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.080 A Doo music video. I got to look that up 0:17:19.119 --> 0:17:19.480 after this. 0:17:19.960 --> 0:17:22.639 Yeah, I'm not familiar with their music videos. 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:27.520 So I read a few more Internet trivia anecdotes about 0:17:27.560 --> 0:17:30.160 Don Coscarelli in the making of this movie, one of which, 0:17:30.680 --> 0:17:34.840 again contributing to the general idea of budgetary scrappiness. Apparently 0:17:35.680 --> 0:17:38.880 they really juiced every last drop they could get out 0:17:38.920 --> 0:17:42.399 of their camera and equipment rentals. So one of the 0:17:42.440 --> 0:17:45.280 stories is that they would shoot on the weekends. I 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:47.320 think that took them like over a year to shoot 0:17:47.359 --> 0:17:50.040 this movie because they were pretty much just shooting on 0:17:50.160 --> 0:17:53.520 weekends and they would rent their camera equipment on Fridays 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:56.840 and return it on Mondays. So they're technically only paying 0:17:57.040 --> 0:17:59.400 for one business day of rental, but then they would 0:17:59.440 --> 0:18:03.680 use it allkend. Another thing is some of the stories 0:18:03.720 --> 0:18:05.879 about the production make it sound like they were not 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:11.120 practicing what industry safety standards for, say stunts and kind 0:18:11.160 --> 0:18:14.800 of dangerous the achievement of dangerous shots. So there are 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:18.800 stories of the director like personally doing camera work for 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:22.960 like filming some of the car chase sequences in not 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:25.119 the best way. Like one thing they did is, you know, 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:27.399 usually when you see characters inside a car and a 0:18:27.480 --> 0:18:31.159 movie talking, the car's not actually moving. They'll have you know, 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:34.160 them sitting in a stationary car, and then they will 0:18:34.240 --> 0:18:37.239 somehow simulate the movement of the outside world around the car. 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:39.600 If it's at night, they might just like move lights around, 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:42.359 or they might have a rear projection or something like that. 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:45.639 That's often how they do it. In this movie, they 0:18:45.760 --> 0:18:48.480 just they just actually had characters driving the cars and 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:51.240 they were acting at the same time. That's not usually 0:18:51.320 --> 0:18:53.720 a great idea. But another story is that there's a 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:55.720 scene in the movie where there's like a car chase 0:18:56.160 --> 0:18:59.800 where one of the characters, Jody, is shooting a gun 0:19:00.200 --> 0:19:02.240 at another car that's chasing them. And I think they 0:19:02.320 --> 0:19:05.880 actually did film this with moving cars, with the director 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:09.520 sort of like sitting on the trunk of a moving 0:19:09.640 --> 0:19:13.760 car filming, you know, the actor playing Jody popping up 0:19:13.800 --> 0:19:16.240 out of the window and shooting at the car behind. 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:17.200 Them with a shotgun. 0:19:17.359 --> 0:19:20.280 Right, I think it had lengths, But even that can 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:21.080 be dangerous that. 0:19:21.320 --> 0:19:21.520 Yeah. 0:19:22.200 --> 0:19:26.200 I love realistic effects too, but a movie production, you know, 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:28.840 no movie is worth somebody actually getting hurt or killed. 0:19:28.920 --> 0:19:30.680 You know, practice safety on sets people. 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:35.840 Now, this was very much a Costarelli family labor of 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:40.199 love here because the producer on this was Dat Cossarelli, 0:19:40.680 --> 0:19:44.040 who was also dad investment counselor at the time, who 0:19:44.119 --> 0:19:46.240 helped his son fund the film and later served as 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:50.960 EP on Don's other films. And then Mom was also involved. 0:19:51.400 --> 0:19:55.520 Kate Cossarelli, who lived nineteen twenty seven through nineteen ninety nine. 0:19:55.960 --> 0:20:01.359 She did makeup, production, design, wardrobe. She she also this 0:20:01.560 --> 0:20:05.560 is super interesting. She was already a novelist apparently, if 0:20:05.600 --> 0:20:08.720 I'm understanding this correctly, She wrote books like Leading Lady, 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:12.840 Fame and Fortune, but she herself wrote the novelization of 0:20:12.960 --> 0:20:16.000 Fantasm based on her son's screenplay, which I think is 0:20:16.440 --> 0:20:17.360 that's that's adorable. 0:20:17.400 --> 0:20:19.680 I love that she had to knife fight Alan Dene 0:20:19.720 --> 0:20:20.840 Foster for the rights, so. 0:20:22.680 --> 0:20:24.840 I don't know how that went down, but it's yeah, 0:20:24.880 --> 0:20:27.760 it's apparently I was looking around for any signs of 0:20:27.840 --> 0:20:33.280 apparently a very sought after book for diehard Phantasm fans, 0:20:34.080 --> 0:20:36.119 but I did run across a few quotes here and 0:20:36.160 --> 0:20:38.760 there of her talking about at adapting it and you know, 0:20:39.080 --> 0:20:41.359 picking up on little details in the film and working 0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:44.520 those out. So uh yeah, it seemed like a labor 0:20:44.560 --> 0:20:55.760 of love for her. All right, Let's get into the cast. 0:20:56.480 --> 0:20:59.080 We mentioned Mike. Mike is the youth. Mike is the 0:20:59.160 --> 0:21:03.080 central character and Phantasm, and Mike was played by A. 0:21:03.320 --> 0:21:07.639 Michael Baldwin born in nineteen sixty three, apparently son of 0:21:07.760 --> 0:21:10.320 animator Gerald Baldwin, who will work on a number of 0:21:10.440 --> 0:21:14.880 older animated shows. So A Michael Baldwin was a child 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:17.960 actor who appeared as early as nineteen seventy six in 0:21:18.040 --> 0:21:20.800 episodes of Starsky and Hutch and Eight Is Enough. Later on, 0:21:21.560 --> 0:21:24.800 he starred as Doug and Kenny and Company from seventy six. 0:21:24.920 --> 0:21:28.480 That's Done's one of Don's previous films, and his post 0:21:28.560 --> 0:21:32.040 Phantasm acting career is is pretty fantasm heavy, and I 0:21:32.119 --> 0:21:35.800 believe he went on to teach acting. None of this 0:21:35.920 --> 0:21:39.080 matters though, because he's I think he's absolutely perfect in Phantasm. 0:21:39.200 --> 0:21:43.840 He's just believably awkward and childlike, but still, you know, clearly, 0:21:44.440 --> 0:21:48.200 you know, beyond the limits of childhood. He's but he's 0:21:48.280 --> 0:21:51.480 also even though he's awkward, he's still charismatic enough to 0:21:51.560 --> 0:21:54.359 serve as the hero of the film, and you know, 0:21:54.440 --> 0:21:58.640 to be this action based character when it's right. So yeah, 0:21:58.720 --> 0:22:01.680 I absolutely love a Michael Baldwin's performance here, and and 0:22:01.720 --> 0:22:07.000 I can understand why fans were disappointed that his role 0:22:07.119 --> 0:22:08.719 was recast in Phantasm too. 0:22:09.000 --> 0:22:11.200 I'm going to ask a question about Mike, but this 0:22:11.400 --> 0:22:15.399 also applies to Jody and especially Reggie. How old is 0:22:15.520 --> 0:22:17.320 anybody in this movie supposed to be? 0:22:18.000 --> 0:22:22.160 Yeah, it's a little little foggy, right, because Mike, for instance, 0:22:23.119 --> 0:22:26.399 I you know, I think it would be reasonable to 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:28.960 think of him as like a as being a high 0:22:28.960 --> 0:22:30.960 school graduate. We have, but we have no idea like 0:22:31.040 --> 0:22:33.840 where he is in terms of high school. I assume 0:22:33.920 --> 0:22:36.480 he's done. Like we don't see we don't I don't 0:22:36.480 --> 0:22:38.240 think we really see much in the way of friends. 0:22:38.440 --> 0:22:39.840 There are a few people here and there. There's no 0:22:39.960 --> 0:22:42.639 I don't think mentioned of school. I don't remember anything 0:22:42.680 --> 0:22:45.720 about like his plans for the future. But in a 0:22:45.800 --> 0:22:48.280 way that's kind of perfect, like that it's perfect for 0:22:48.440 --> 0:22:51.960 this this kind of character who is adrift in the 0:22:52.160 --> 0:22:55.240 very early stages of adulthood, that has no concept of 0:22:55.400 --> 0:22:58.359 like what the future means for him, and is already 0:22:58.400 --> 0:23:02.359 a feeling himself attached or partially detached from the protective 0:23:03.000 --> 0:23:04.159 aura of childhood. 0:23:04.520 --> 0:23:07.720 That's interesting. You read him as a high school graduate, 0:23:07.880 --> 0:23:11.440 I don't know. So he drives a car that you 0:23:11.560 --> 0:23:13.879 can't tell if he's supposed to be doing that legally, 0:23:15.119 --> 0:23:17.560 and he knows how to fix cars and things like that, 0:23:18.320 --> 0:23:20.840