Phantasm V: Ravager is the (derp) fifth movie in the inexplicably long running Phantasm series of gore-filled weird horror movies. The original came out in 1979 and was really a head-trip (and scratcher) of a freaky little horror movie, part 2 was pretty bad and came out in 1988, part 3 in 1994, part 4 in 1998 and part 5 just this year. They (also inexplicably) star the same core group of actors reprising their rolls over the decades (in fact, The Tall Man played by the inexplicably-named Angus Scrimm died earlier this year at the age of 89.).
Long preamble for a movie series whose existence is much more interesting than this final film. This movie was clearly made on a budget and not just from the dodgy to sometimes terrible visual FX but also in terms of how its structured as a dimension/reality hopping story that takes a long time to go nowhere before giving us what was probably meant to be an epic conclusion to the series storyline. I rather feel bad for the writers, producers, and actors that, after all these years, they limped their series to such a poor conclusion.
Not that it’s a good series once you get past the first flick – but give credit where it’s due that they piled together five movies of 37 years… regardless of whether or not mainstream movie goers have ever heard of it (the series has a significant fan following, I gather).
Caught this one available as an On Demand movie – I don’t know if it came out in a limited theatrical run or not… not that it’s worth checking out at the theater unless you are one of those hardcore fans. It’s just not going to sell anyone on the series and for more casual viewers of the series like myself, it’s kind of a whatever bad movie.
Score: 58