Blu-Ray Review: The Phantasm Collection (1979-2015)

Saying Phantasm is a weird movie is like saying the sun is warm, water is wet, and Johnny Depp's next film role will involve a silly wig. Saying the entire 5 film serious is perplexing, bordering on baffling, is like saying that Johnny Depp film is going to be terrible and flop like a motherfucker. However, much unlike every Johnny Depp film of the past decade (at least), what many might consider flaws in other films work perfectly in Phantasm's favor. The bizarre, mysterious, stream-of-conscious style of the films, in addition to startling originality and the chemistry of series leads Michael Baldwin, Reggie Bannister and Angus Scrimm, is what keeps people coming back 38 years after the original; and now all that glorious lunacy is in one Blu Ray box set out now from Well Go USA Entertainment.

For those not in the know, the very basic plot of the series is essentially that classic good vs evil story; Mike, his sometimes alive, sometimes dead, sometimes something inbetween older brother Jody, and their friend/former ice cream man Reggie against an entity known simply as The Tall Man, an indestructible necromancer who transforms human bodies into dwarf creatures to use as labor in an alternate dimension or another planet or something. Sound weird? Oh my sweet babies, that was only the most basic way I could think to explain this decades-spanning series. Add to all that a healthy dose of dream logic that would befuddle even Argento or Fulci at their most nonsensical and you have something fans (or phans, as they like to call themselves) have endlessly debated since the 70s.

Luckily, not knowing what the hell is going on at any given time won't be the fault of the transfers as these movies have never looked better. Even the first film looks fresh and crisp, and unless you want to shell out the cash for the  recent 4K release that was supervised by JJ Abrams (one of the series' many loyal celeb phans) this is probably the best we're gonna get. In fact, I really only have one complaint about the technical aspects of the set. A big home video pet peeve of mine is when the audio levels aren't mixed and levelled properly, and unfortunately Phantasm 2 didn't fair as well as the others in that regard. What's especially strange is that this is the Scream Factory BRD, which is especially crazy as their technical work tends to be consistently great. However, I'm willing to let all that slide as everything else is so good.

In terms of special features, there's plenty of new stuff here to justify the upgrade from whatever DVD or Blu Ray you already have. As far as I can tell all special features from the Anchor Bay and Universal releases have been ported over, and they've been supplemented with new commentary tracks, new making of docs, and some more unique stuff like cast Q&A sessions filmed in various cons. In addition to all this, the set comes with a book of even more interviews and a massive double-sided poster which features the artwork of Tall Man featured on the outside of the box on one side and a redux of the first film's nightmarish original key artwork.

Series writer, director and producer Don Coscarelli has crafted one of the most unique, original, and just plain awesome franchises in the history of horror, and while admittedly this set isn't quite as cool as the DVD set Anchor Bay released in the UK back in 2005 that had the four films packaged inside a replica of one of the iconic silver spheres, but it's pretty damn good.