Bubba Ho-Tep.

Review #2298: Bubba Ho-Tep.

Cast: 

Bruce Campbell (Elvis Presley / Sebastian Haff), Ossie Davis (John F. "Jack" Kennedy), Ella Joyce (The Nurse), Heidi Marnhout (Callie Thomas), Bob Ivy (Bubba Ho-Tep), Larry Pennell (Kemosabe), Daniel Roebuck (Hearse Driver), and Reggie Bannister (Rest Home Administrator) Directed by Don Coscarelli (#1459 - Phantasm)

Review: 

"You know what? Bruce’s fans have always known he’s a great actor. Everybody in Hollywood just sees him has this clownish character. But here he gets to be really subtle. His best moments in this film are not showy at all, they are simple. And you can almost hear his fans think: I knew he was a great actor! I knew it! I’m glad that the film also appeals to his fans. Because it’s a story about age and death and friendship. It might apply more to someone in their forties or fifties or sixties. But to have the Evil Dead fans enjoying it, brings me so much satisfaction. "

In 1994, Joe R. Lansdale wrote a novella involving a not quite-dead Elvis Presley living out the end of his days in a Texas resting home...at least if a mummy has anything to say about it. Of course, that novella was weird enough to fit right in for an anthology collection (called "The King is Dead"), although most stories don't generally involve a growth being found around a certain male body part in detail. Around that time, he had been interested in working with Don Coscarelli (an optioning of his story "Dead in the West" went nowhere). Folks might remember him as the director behind the first four Phantasm films, with Bubba Ho-Tep being his first non-Phantasm film since Survival Quest (1989). Coscarelli was recommended by Sam Raimi to approach Bruce Campbell about doing a film together, and while it took a few years to get around to filming. Coscarelli wrote the screenplay that came mostly from Lansdale's novella, which had merely alluded to how Elvis switched places with an impersonator. The movie was shot at the Rancho Los Amigos Rehabilitation Hospital in Downey, California to go along with effects provided by KNB EFX. The resulting movie (one that basically had no problem with the dialogue except for just who would narrate it, which eventually went to Campbell) received a limited distribution on the roadshow circuit (as toured by the director with the over three dozen prints struck of the film). While the film did not exactly inspire "Bubba Nosferatu: Curse of the She-Vampires" that you can see teased at the end credits (namely because Campbell had some issues with Coscarelli's ideas, which apparently intended to have Paul Giamatti play Colonel Tom Parker), the film has a fair cult following two decades since its release. Coscarelli returned to directing features with John Dies at the End (2012) while Lansdale wrote another Bubba story with Bubba and the Cosmic Bloodsuckers in 2017.

Sure, you go right for the title when it comes to wondering about the movie, it just stands right out. Aside from the casual interest in wondering just what lurks beyond the obvious in a mummy and an Elvis caricature, there are a few fun moments to have in the neat kind of shaggy comedy-horror movies. It casually moves along for 92 minutes for a mummy movie that goes with the most ideal target for a lumbering ancient being (that gets a cheeky explanation for where it came from: lost during a museum tour): old people that nobody will suspect to be sucked out of their life at a nursing home. Coscarelli took great care to make a film where our hero is not merely fodder for cheap jokes but instead is someone that we believe is the real deal in magnetic old glory that lives on just as much as the image people hold of Elvis in his prime. Campbell really delivered when it mattered most in pathos, pure and simple. Davis apparently was keen on the script enough to overrule his agent and express interest (Coscarelli had Mick Garris write a letter on his behalf asking Davis himself). He lends a charming dignity to the proceedings that has clear chemistry with Campbell and even a few moments to engage in humor (as one does when playing on JFK conspiracies and kooky explanations for claiming to be not dead and also dyed). The peril that comes with aging is knowing that the regrets will pop in our old minds just as much as the memories we tried to make in what we called our glory days. Some people get to live out their days in a blaze of choices and others sit there to rot in ways I can't imagine, and the film dwells in the company of aging goes well with the snappy dialogue that comes through (narration or otherwise) in mummy confrontation, codger style. The climax is poignant enough to deliver what you would expect from its surroundings that benefits its audience and sends them remembering that all really can be well in the end. It is straight to the point in offbeat entertainment that has a few chuckles and a worthwhile duo going along with the material on its face to deliver a movie worth popping in one night on the strength of its worthwhile reputation over the past two decades.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

Phantasm.

Review #1459: Phantasm.

Cast: 
Angus Scrimm (The Tall Man), A. Michael Baldwin (Mike Pearson), Bill Thornbury (Jody Pearson), Reggie Bannister (Reggie), Kathy Lester (Lady in Lavender), Bill Cone (Tommy), Mary Ellen Shaw (The fortune-teller), and Terrie Kalbus (The fortune-teller's granddaughter) Written and Directed by Don Coscarelli.

Review: 
"I had no plans, when I made the first Phantasm, to create a myth. I was only trying to make an effective low-budget movie, which might propel an audience member or two out of their seats on occasion. If anything, it was the fans who elevated our little tale into myth."
Sometimes there is nothing better than an ambitious horror film to watch, particularly ones with a small budget and an interesting perspective in mixing fantasy and the supernatural to make for a cult favorite and a shining achievement for writer-director-editor-cinematographer Coscarelli. This was the third film of his career, which had started at a young age with a liking for cameras and filmmaking. At the age of 18, he started production on his first film in Jim the World's Greatest (which he co-directed and co-wrote with Craig Mitchell), which he help sell to Universal Pictures at the age of 19 for release in 1975. The next year came Kenny & Company, which was also a family film (both being dramas, with the latter verging into comedy). Each had actors that would appear in this film, such as Baldwin, Bannister, and Scrimm. All in all, Coscarelli has directed ten films (with one being direct-to-video) while being involved in all five films of the Phantasm series, which had its last film (not directed by him) in Phantasm: Ravager (2016).

The idea for the film came to Coscarelli in a dream, one where he had to escape never ending marble corridors with a sphere of chrome and needles chasing him. There are plenty of little things that made for a quirky classic, such as its interesting editing that make for a disjointed haunted feel, done to turn its initial cut of three hours (with plenty of subplots and character development) into a faster paced 89 minute film, made on a budget around $300,000 (with his father being the primary producer) over the course of two years with shooting done on weekends with a rented camera that could be used for 20-hour shoots. The result is a weird but ultimately involving film that rises above its low-budget trappings to make for a worthwhile experience, moving and interesting with its family story and style for a jumble of scares worthy of a curiosity (with a recent restoration on Blu-ray being the best way to seek it out). It isn't exactly a film for the acting to levy much praise, but Scrimm is certainly the one to fit the role. Scrimm was a journalist and liner note writer (where he won a Grammy for Best Album Notes - Classical in 1975) before he took on acting, which he would cultivate a niche for appearances in films from time to time over the next few decades (including all five Phantasm films) prior to his death in 2016. It isn't hard to see why he has a status of his own in cult followings, since there is something quite unnerving about his presence, one where he doesn't have to speak much in order to raise a scare by being oneself. Baldwin and Thornbury make for a curious pair, bonding in the inevitable path from figuring out what they are dealing with fair candor and timing. Bannister, an actor alongside flower delivery man and club worker (who has starred in all five films) proves a fun-loving presence with plenty of resourcefulness and charm. The film achieves a middle ground between making compelling chills and gore (the spheres appear just twice but prove effective) contrast with the shift in reality in our understanding of its main threat, where following along is only half of the battle. Combined with a creeping music cue from Fred Myrow and Malcolm Segrave, this turns out to be a weird but ultimately satisfying film with delving into death and dreams to make a worthy cult classic to check out and follow along with as a film of its era in horror.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.