I knew this was going to be a very special made-for-TV movie when, inside the first 5 mins., the lead detective, H. Phillip Lovecraft, holds up a voodoo doll and says, "it's the murder weapon".
Watching Cast a Deadly Spell is kind of like watching The Maltese Falcon if it were produced by the people responsible for the Disney Channel original movie Halloweentown.
The magic is awesomely inventive. In a cat and mouse scene, a hardened henchman whose boss just got swindled out of a text has to figure out which bathroom stall the swindler is in. He puts water into his hands and blows on it. The water steams and then turns into a bolt of fire that he throws across a bathroom floor to burn out his mouse. When the swindler offers the henchman money, the henchman spells the cash into a flurry that lacerates his prey until he is unrecognizable.
Lovecraft, our Bogart who strikes a match on anything but his matchbook, is an anomaly -- he doesn't use magic for "personal reasons". Everyone is chasing after the Necronomicon, and Lovecraft is tasked with hunting it down the old fashioned way.
Next time you find yourself in the mood for cheesy noir fantasy, throw this on. It rains blood, virgins have special killing powers, gargoyles track people, prehistoric creatures rise from tomato sauce and zombies work in construction.
CW: there are some insensitivities to queer/trans culture; racial fetishism.
Watching Cast a Deadly Spell is kind of like watching The Maltese Falcon if it were produced by the people responsible for the Disney Channel original movie Halloweentown.
The magic is awesomely inventive. In a cat and mouse scene, a hardened henchman whose boss just got swindled out of a text has to figure out which bathroom stall the swindler is in. He puts water into his hands and blows on it. The water steams and then turns into a bolt of fire that he throws across a bathroom floor to burn out his mouse. When the swindler offers the henchman money, the henchman spells the cash into a flurry that lacerates his prey until he is unrecognizable.
Lovecraft, our Bogart who strikes a match on anything but his matchbook, is an anomaly -- he doesn't use magic for "personal reasons". Everyone is chasing after the Necronomicon, and Lovecraft is tasked with hunting it down the old fashioned way.
Next time you find yourself in the mood for cheesy noir fantasy, throw this on. It rains blood, virgins have special killing powers, gargoyles track people, prehistoric creatures rise from tomato sauce and zombies work in construction.
CW: there are some insensitivities to queer/trans culture; racial fetishism.