Cast A Deadly Spell

Los Angeles, 1948. Virtually every citizen practices the Black Arts, especially underworld types. One holdout is hardboiled private eye H. Phillip Lovecraft (Fred Ward), whose strict code of honor leaves him armed with only his street smarts when he's thrown into a case involving a Necronomicon, the infamous forbidden book of spells capable of summoning all-powerful evil gods called "Old Ones." Millionaire Amos Hackshaw (David Warner) possessed an authentic copy until it was stolen, and he hires Lovecraft to track down the accused thief, gangster Harry Borden (Clancy Brown). Lovecraft uncovers a real-estate scheme (using cheap zombie labor) that masks the real scheme by Hackshaw's femme fatale wife, Olivia (Alexandra Powers), to offer up virginal ward, Connie Stone (Julianne Moore), as a human sacrifice to a hideous Old One in exchange for world domination, as the detective watches helplessly. But, thanks to raging teen hormones, Connie isn't the virgin she used to be. At the ritual invocation led by Borden (who's in cahoots with Olivia), the Old One rejects Connie and kills Borden instead. Breaking his zero-tolerance resolution on magic, Lovecraft utters a rune that banishes the entity, and turns Olivia over to the police. The Necronomicon he keeps for himself--just in case.

The hero is named, of course, after the real Howard Phillips Lovecraft, the cult horror author whose eldritch tales of evil, extradimensional deities and cosmic terror have generally frustrated previous Hollywood attempts to adapt them (THE DUNWICH HORROR, THE HAUNTED PALACE, FROM BEYOND). The glory of CAST A DEADLY SPELL is that it does right by both of the genres it fuses--Lovecraftian horror and noirish detective pulp fiction--retaining respect and fidelity to each, despite the tangible sense of self-parody (a cop named Bradbury, a Sinatra-type crooner hexed to sing backwards). Fred Ward's pose as the world-weary shamus stops short of caricature, while the supporting cast of mugs, molls, and ghouls seems to know full well that it's onto a good thing. The tentacled, cephalopod Old One is particularly faithful to Lovecraftian prose and testimony to the generous budget apportioned to this made-for-cable-TV venture. One should note the presence of blockbuster fantasy producer Gale Ann Hurd (ALIENS, THE ABYSS, THE TERMINATOR) in the care lavished on material destined for a smaller canvas. Hurd was one of the few carryovers from this production to WITCH HUNT (1996), a sequel directed by Paul Schrader, with Dennis Hopper taking over the role of Lovecraft. Both productions premiered on HBO. (Violence, adult situations, substance abuse.) leave a comment