Watching Charles Band films is always great because it is fun to try and guess what other horror films he “borrowed” ideas from. The man has made a long career out of reusing other movie schemes, ripping himself off so many times he probably doesn’t even realize he is doing it anymore. His favorite sub-genre to milk is the “tiny killer flick,” thanks to the surprise success of 1984’s Ghoulies, which prompted Band to make 1986’s Troll, 1989’s Puppet Master, 1990’s Subspecies, plus countless others.
1991’s Spellcaster followed one of his more well-known movies Doctor Modrid: Master of the Unknown. It is about a wizard (Adam Ant) who lends out his home to a VJ named Richard Blade so he can hold a contest which would award the winner one million dollars. If you have watched more than one Empire Pictures or Full Moon movie then you should also recognize the castle where the wizard resides because it has appeared in countless other Band films. The reason for this is not only does Band like to recycle ideas, he also enjoys reusing locations. It just happens that this location was an actual castle that he owned, and was the perfect setting for many horror films, including Stuart Gordan’s superb Castle Freak.
Saying Spellcaster is a rip of Vincent Price’s House on Haunted Hill would be like claiming any zombie film was a rip of Night of the Living Dead. Yes several people are locked in an old building in hopes of winning money, but it has more to do with the fact that it is a great premise for a horror movie than it does with Band trying to rape William Castle’s legacy. This concept has been used many times in the horror genre, and in more recent films it has been used to milk the “Reality TV” craze, like we saw in 2002’s Halloween Resurrection starring Busta Rymes. Since Spellcaster was released in the 90’s, Rock TV, rather than the Internet, is sponsoring the contest, and 7 contestants will get to spend the weekend with rock star Casandra Castle while earning the chance to find the million-dollar prize.
Another thing Band liked to milk was the whole rock and roll angle; he even once signed the washed-up rock band Quiet Riot to his short-lived music label so they could produce the scores for his films. Also, one should not forget that Full Moon’s 1992 Bad Channels featured Blue Oyster Cult (”Don’t Fear the Reaper”) and the equally washed-up ex-MTV VJ Marta Quinn. Band’s love of mixing rock music and horror is once again apparent in Spellcaster, which starts off with a cheesy rock video from Casandra. By using new wave star Adam Ant, Band once again captures the feeling of the early 90’s, which was still suffering from an 80’s hangover at the time. You could even link Ant’s eccentric-magical villain to David Bowie’s character from the 1986 Muppet filled movie Labyrinth, something that is really not surprising since Charles always did have a thing for puppets and toys.
Spellcaster also features no nudity or gore, something that may seem like an anomaly (especially from a man who had a hand in Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama). However, Band films did tend to go both ways, especially near the middle of the 90’s, towards the end of Full Moon’s first run, the films did seem to start leaning more towards the PG-13 side. This may have had something to do with the end of mom and pop video stores and the rise of bigger chains like Blockbuster, who frowned upon “adult” material. This also could have been the reason Band launched his family friendly production company called Moon Beam that released kid orientated films. 1993’s Prehysteria about tiny dinosaurs conveniently hit video store shelves the same year Spielberg’s Jurassic Park was breaking box office records.
While Charles Band has his fingerprints on more horror movies than you can count, he never had a problem branching out to many different genres, which can be seen in his 1990 Sci-Fi movies — Robot Jox, Crash and Burn, Mandroid, and of course the wonderful Trancers series starring Tim Tomerson as the hardboiled Trancer killing cop Jack Deth, with Helen Hunt as his “punk rock” side-kick. While it is an obvious transition from the horror genre to the Sci-Fi genre, Band seemed to be a little late trying to cash in on the whole sword and sorcery genre with films like Spellcaster and Doctor Mordrid. The last Conan film was in 1984, and even the Italians (the biggest “borrowers”) had released their version, Fulci’s Conquest in 1983. The comedy The Barbarians (featuring the Barbarian Twins – Double Trouble ’91) should have signaled the death of the genre in 1987, but the Deathstalker franchise went on to be milked into 1992, and the Beastmaster went to the future in his 1991 sequel, Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time, even making one last appearance in 1995. So I guess there was still a little gas left in the tank, and directors and producers like Jim Wynorski and Band were determined to suck it dry. We have all been guilty of riding on “E” before, they just rode it to its bitter end.
Band never seemed to hit the mark with the sword and sorcery genre, and he failed to modernize it with Spellcaster. While he has turned in many horror/sci-fi classics, the only film he was ever involved in for this genre worth mentioning was 1983’s excellent Dungeonmaster. The timing was better, and it should crack any fan’s top ten list of Dungeon and Dragon type cash-ins.
While Spellcaster may not be his best, it is a fun enough film to take Band fans down memory lane. It did for me, making me want to dust off my Full Moon collection and relive the glory days of great direct to video movies.
