Phantasm II ** (1988, James Le Gros, Reggie Bannister, Angus Scrimm, Paula Irvine, A Michael Baldwin) – Classic Movie Review 3276

Writer-director Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm II is the unnecessary and less imaginative 1988 sequel to his 1979 cult horror movie Phantasm.

Mike, the teenage boy from Phantasm is now a young man (and now played by James Le Gros) released from a psychiatric hospital after agreeing with his doctors that he’d imagined all the events of the first film. And now he is trying, with the help of his buddy Reggie and the psychically bonded beautiful strange girl Liz (Paula Irvine) who is appearing in his dreams, to track down the cadaverous alien undertaker he uncovered in the first film.

Angus Scrimm again plays The Tall Man undertaker, Reggie Bannister also returns as Reggie the ice cream man and A Michael Baldwin is back briefly as Young Mike.

More violent, and more costly than before, this is a gun-ho Rambo-style horror movie with a cold and clinical feel to it, held back by the lack of plot. Some satisfying action sequences and creepy special effects help to make up for the incoherence on screen and of course again Scrimm is a valuable asset, once more impressive and truly creepy as the cadaverous alien.

Universal Pictures’ executives did not want A. Michael Baldwin to reprise his role as Mike in Phantasm II (1988) because they thought he had been out of the movie business for too long. Don Coscarelli strongly supported him and even brought him in to audition for the part, but it was ultimately given to James Le Gros. Baldwin said: ‘It’s just a case of not getting the job. Of an actor auditioning for a part that of course he thought should have been his and then not getting it. Happens all the time.’

There are three more sequels so far: Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead (1994), Phantasm IV: Oblivion (1998) and Scrimm finally made a fifth film, the David Hartman-directed Phantasm: Ravager, released in 2016. A Limited Edition DVD/Blu-ray Dual Format Collection of all five movies is out on 24 April 2017. It includes a new 4K restoration of Phantasm, overseen by Star Wars and Star Trek director J J Abrams.

The 6′ 4″ evil screen villain Angus Scrimm (aka Lawrence Rory Guy), most famous as The Tall Man in Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm (1979) and its sequels, died at the age of 89 on 9 January 2016.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3276

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/