MY CALL: This is another one of those movies where the plot is completely vacuous, the characters all suck, and absolutely random, weird, supernatural things and/or monsters befall the victims with no rhyme or reason. But for one of those kinds of movies, it’s good enough for a one time viewing. I enjoyed it enough. MORE MOVIES LIKE Spellcaster: Want more spellcraft from your spellcasters? Well, there’s The Kiss (1988), Warlock (1989), The Craft (1996) or Spell (2020).
Tom (Harold Pruett; Embrace of the Vampire) and Jackie (Gail O’Grady; Lycan) win a TV show drawing to be million-dollar treasure hunt contestants in a castle in Italy with celebrity Cassandra Castle (Bunty Bailey; Dolls). The other contestants include the perpetually-snacking likable glutton Harlan (Michael Zorek; Teen Wolf Too), Myrna (Martha Demson), Teri (Kim Johnston Ulrich; Rumpelstiltskin, Werewolf), the Italian Casanova Tony (Marcello Modugno; Demons, You’ll Die at Midnight), the pretentious French Yvette (Traci Lind; Class of 1999, Fright Night part 2), and Jamie (Dale Wyatt; Troll, From Beyond, Ghoulies II). Our over-the-top RockTV show host (Adam Ant; Nomads) introduces everyone to the rules, amps up the enthusiasm, and makes futile efforts to mitigate Cassandra’s reckless alcoholism.
A zany cliché looming over his crystal ball, Sr. Diablo (Adam Ant; Nomads) remotely observes the contestants in his castle. They’re almost all despicable people. They lie, cheat, seduce, sexually assault, vandalize… only Tom and Jackie are nice. So let’s assume they will be our only survivors. But contrary to the movie title, our “spellcaster” Sr. Diablo does very little actual spellcasting in the classic sense. Rather, he engages in supernatural parlor tricks and has a rather constant magical control over his castle.
The first death is woefully bad. A car just explodes to no satisfaction of any viewer who enjoys death scenes. A lame deadly fall likewise falls flat. But thankfully things quickly get interesting when a goblin-like statue and a grand wooden chair come to life and kill the intolerable French woman. Yet more fun, the basement is a crypt full of the groaty living dead. There’s even a transformation scene of a werepig. Yes, were-pig! That’s right up there in the wacky category with the werepanther from Waxwork II (1992)! This werepig transformation is easily the coolest and most elaborate effect of the movie.
There’s even a demon-troll monster of sorts, a Lovecraftian flying thing that eats a guy’s face, a demonic dog… This is definitely one of those movies where I suspect the effects crew got to raid a studio’s storage closet and re-use a bunch of monstrous props, masks, suits, and the like. Because these effects seem so random it’s silly. Absolutely random, weird, supernatural things and/or monsters befall the victims with no rhyme or reason. This may sound bad—and normally it would be—yet the effects are satisfyingly diverse and decently executed! It may not be a creature feature, but it just might scratch that itch… in a zany way.
Director Rafal Zielinski (Hangman’s Curse) has never really done much—horror, I mean. So maybe we shouldn’t expect much of his movie. It’s nothing great, pretty dumb, but also pretty fun! I enjoyed this nonsense even if I never feel that I’ll see it again.