Le maître du cauchemar

"Wishmaster" is better than I expected. It's quite a bit more entertaining than I thought it might be. As a direct-to-video series of horror flicks from the '90s, it had been on my radar for a long time, but I had never heard it spoken of or recommended, which is a shame.

Of course, it raises a flag that the movie was "executive produced" by Wes Craven. A lot of people have been burnt by that; generally people who don't know what an executive producer does, ie. nothing.

I wonder if the presence of the great, forever underrated Robert Englund ("A Nightmare on Elm Street") is owing to Craven's brand, however. And let's not forget the movie also features Tony Todd ("Candyman") and Kane Hodder ("Friday the 13th") in cameos, as well as Sam Raimi's brother Ted, and is narrated by Angus Scrimm, known as The Tall Man in "Phantasm".

The problem with the movie is that is doesn't hold together very well from scene to scene. It has many entertaining moments and good lines, but the story is simplistic, yet told in a confusing way. One indispensable aspect of these mid-'90s horror flicks is that they were made right before CGI came and ruined everything, and the movie has a lot of cool, practical gore effects.

Geez, after reading all the thumbs-down reviews, I feel almost embarrassed. I _liked_ Wishmaster. No, the idea of wishes-gone-awry isn't particularly original, but there are still some interesting elements done with it: a guard says he'd like to see the Djinn go through him and...it does (heh). Tammy Lauren is adequate as the spunky heroine, and Andrew Divoff (mostly consigned to minor B-villain roles - check him out in the Highlander TV series) makes a chilling threat. Jenny O'Hara makes the most of her role as resident supernatural expert. Yes, the gore is excessive, but I'm not sure if that's a concession to the 90's audience, or a directorial conceit - I'm willing to assume its the former. For a supernatural thriller/horror (as opposed to a Scream-type slasher/thriller), Wishmaster strikes me as one of the better efforts to come along since the last Nightmare and the first Candyman.

This was one of my first horror movies (one of many). I first saw it when I was eleven. Back then it was extremely scary, but now, nine years later, it still had those "peekaboo"-moments.

If you want a scary and well made horror movie with a thrilling plot, this is not something for you. But if you want a gory, humorers and easygoing b-movie, this is just what you are looking for.

Although I usually like extremely complex plots, I also like watching movies with plots a three-year old could come up with - like Wishmaster and most action movies. The heroine is cliché - traumatizing past, strong and willful, protective older sister to an impulsive younger. The djinn is also quite cliché, with his cunning and evil ways. He has "I am not going to succeed in my evil quest to enslave mankind" written all over his face.

The movie is all about gruesome and gory things happening to people. Most things that happen are funny and gory. It's not like those movies that look away when the blade meets the neck - here we see everything, the camera even stays to show us what it looks like afterward.

Entertaining - but not much more.

Despite being marketed heavily as a 'Wes Craven film,' the horror mastermind neither wrote nor directed this campy nineties splatter-fest. Also, if you were drooling at the thought of seeing Freddy, Candyman and Jason on the same billing (Robert Englund, Tony Todd and Kane Hodder are all in it) then you may be a little disappointed, as their input amounts to just a few cameos here and there. Anyway, minor gripes out of the way, 'Wishmaster' is actually pretty good fun - if you're into this sort of film.

While bringing an ancient statue to America, it accidentally breaks, releasing a big blue cartoon genie, voiced by Robin Williams, who happily makes various pop culture references and grants our plucky young hero the wishes he needs to win the princess' heart. No, not really. This is one genie you wouldn't find in a Walt Disney movie - he delights in making all the wishes he grants impact on the person who made them in the most negatively-bad way possible. Plus he's not half as sweet as Robin William's classic genie - this one has fangs, red eyes and all sorts of weird, slippery appendages sprouting out of him. Now, it's up to our leading lady, Alexandra Amberson (played by a Linda Hamilton-esque Tammy Lauren) to get this genie back in his bottle - so to speak.

I know a lot of hard-core fans objected to the 'change' in the 'Nightmare on Elm Street' films when Freddy started becoming less scary and more comedic, taking pleasure in his kills with a snappy one-liner here and there. Well, if you (like me!) didn't mind this, then you should also enjoy 'Wishmaster.' The titular evil character is certainly a villain of the latter Freddy films, taking his time to mess with his victims, rather than kill them outright. I felt this possibly works better here in 'Wishmaster' than the 'Elm Street' franchise because the Wishmaster himself - technically - can't kill anyone outright. He has to mess with them enough to get them to (inadvertently) kill themselves. Yes, that sounds a bit weird and you'll have to watch the film to see how.

The film has a real 'nineties' feel; it's not just the clothes, scenery and hairstyles, but it was part of the latter half of the decade where horror films really started to make a comeback (largely due to 'Scream' I seem to recall) and they were really having fun with the budget they were given. Yes, there are hardly any A-list actors involved and the script is a little clunky as times, but there are plenty of excellent practical effects, creepy sets and a genuine desire to try and do something (a little) different.

Wishmaster' isn't 'dark and brooding' like today's horror films, but if you're in a forgiving mood and don't expect too much, this one is certainly entertaining enough to keep you occupied for an hour and a half. Plus is spawned numerous sequels (although not as many as Freddy or Jason), but that's hardly a benchmark with which to judge a horror film, is it?

Firstly, this is a movie that is defiantly B-Grade, and it shines all the more for it. It has a cast of iconic B-Grade horror movie stars - Tony "Candyman" Todd, Kane "Jason Voorhies" Hodder, Andrew Divoff, Ted Raimi, and of course the greatest (to me, personally) horror icon, Robert Englund. We also get cameos from Verne "Mini Me" Troyer, Angus "Tall Man" Scrimm (albeit only in voice form), John Carpenter staple George 'Buck' Flower, and Ricco "Frost from Aliens" Ross among others.

Despite being a 1997 movie, the special effects feel late-80s, as befitting it's B-Movie status, I guess, but they don't come across particularly bad or dated in any way.

The acting from our lead, Tammy Lauren, is everything you'd expect from a B Movie, but not always distractingly so, and the story is basic enough to bring the gore - an evil Djinn is released and twists wishes immediately, if not directly affecting the wisher.

It's worth a watch, even if just to see the aforementioned horror icons.