Fantasma: Devastador

Not at all what I expected. At first I was all enthralled, but then as I saw what they were doing with the story I was more like "What the heck, guys?"

For this being the "last" one, they sure didn't tie up any loose ends. I felt the general theme was a cop-out. I waiting for it to resolve, but it never did. Well, it kind of did. Too much bouncing around and not enough substance. Perhaps if it were another 20 to 30 minutes of substance, it would have been an awesome movie. Substance as in meaningful human interaction, dialog, dynamic plot devices... cutaway scenes to previous movies did not help.

Don Coscarelli did not direct it and I hear it had a really low budget, so maybe that's what happened??

I thought Reggie Bannister did a good job.

I can't go into details as I do not want to generate a spoiler alert.

Phantasm Ravager is the most recent(and final?) installment to the Phantasm series. While the film is very low budget, as a fan I enjoyed this quite a bit. It has been a while since I saw the last couple of direct to video sequels and seeing this makes me want to check them out again. This film takes us full circle with the original cast of Reggie, Michael, Jody and of course The Tall Man. This story is taken from Reggie's perspective on his search for Michael and his hunt for The Tall Man. This film jumps around to multiple realiities/universes, which ultimately leaves it up to the viewer to decide what is real and what is a dream. Reggie gives a great performance as lead and aging action hero at battle with the forces of evil. In the little down time that he has, he still plays a mean guitar and has some game with the ladies. There are nods to Bubba Ho Tep and while I can't say this film blew me away, as a fan of the series I was satisfied and entertained with this. Reggie Bannister is a very charismatic leading man, his performance here is great and is very under rated in my opinion.

Reggie (Reggie Bannister) is wandering through the desert seeking out his friend Mike and the evil Tall Man (Angus Scrimm). Along his journey, he is hunted down by the dangerous spheres and stumbles upon the gorgeous Dawn.

I have to talk about the actors. Reggie and Angus were fine, of course, as they know exactly who their characters are. Dawn Cody is the worst part, with awful acting as Dawn (though she seems to be better as Jane, strangely enough). Daniel Roebuck is a nice addition, even if he seems out of place.

Joe Leydon and Marten Carlson both criticized the film's narrative cohesiveness. Leydon speculated that the film's troubled production may have cause this, and Carlson more directly blamed the film's origin as a series of shorts. This is a legitimate concern. The film is quite a mess, even in a series that has some bizarre continuity. Anyone going in to this without knowledge of the series will be completely confused. (But, of course, it seems obvious not to watch "part five" without seeing earlier chapters.)

I'm happy to admit that I find the story lines to the Phantasm films a bit of a challenge to follow, their freewheeling, anything goes, dream-logic approach not being the easiest thing to grasp. But then that's all part of the series' charm, creator Don Coscarelli having forged an intriguing franchise that writes (and rewrites) its own rules and which constantly surprises.

Ravager, the first Phantasm film not to be directed by Coscarelli (David Hartman takes the reins), fits the mould perfectly with a bizarre narrative that sees its unlikely hero Reggie (Reggie Bannister) flip-flopping between several distinctly different realities, the film never letting on which of these, if any, is his genuine existence. In one reality, Reggie is wandering the desert searching for long lost friend Mike (A. Michael Baldwin) when he encounters a woman called Dawn (Dawn Cody); in another, he is in hospital suffering from early onset dementia, suggesting that the Tall Man and his minions are a figment of his deteriorating mental state; Reggie also finds himself in a version of Earth where the Tall Man and his spheres are in control and where Mike is leading a desperate band of freedom fighters.

Not a lot of this makes much sense, and little is really resolved by the end of the movie, but the fun is in seeing much-loved characters returning for one last adventure, in watching the silver spheres causing more bloody mayhem (in this chapter, a horse gets drilled, and an exploding spiky sphere blows someone's head apart!), and in seeing just how bonkers it all gets. Ravager has a gun-toting dwarf, sees Reggie out-driving some spheres while blasting at them with a hand cannon, and features spheres the height of skyscrapers, but it could have done with a bit more gore in the second half for my liking. Still, it's not a bad way to spend some time and should keep most avid Phans reasonably happy for the duration.

Having seen all the others films in this series, I felt this one was a big disappointment. The acting and effects are good but definitely not the script. Though it was a novelty having an entire cast stay together long enough to make this many movies, and seeing a montage in which they age, this, as the final film in the franchise, went out not with a band nor a whimper, but simply...went. With all the switches from one dimension to another, soon the audience is apt to soon be as confused as Reggie.

No explanation was ever given in any of the movies for why all this was happening and it isn't given here, the little speeches of "loyalty" which should really read "friendship" notwithstanding. Although the actors do a credible job, and the special effects are well-done, along with brief glimpses of black humor, the plot is a confusing mess leaving nothing but disappointment in its wake. This movie doesn't tie up any loose threads or offer any explanations. Technically, it's not even a final entry since the story merely stops...with an open ending which could conceivably herald another episode, if the "Tall Man" himself, Angus Scrimm, were going to be around. Once wonder if perhaps since this film was dedicated to his memory, everyone thought it would be too difficult to replace someone fitting that role so aptly.

Whatever the reasons, I felt it was time wasted and was left with the feeling the spirit as well as the fright of the original film had long since fled.