Halloween Horrorfest 2018: WITCHBOARD (1986)

I’m not sure when I saw this originally.  I know it was on video, and I’m sure it was before she made her big splash writhing on top of a car for then-husband John Coverdale, so we’re talking roughly thirty years ago.  But I know it was the film that made me fall in love with Tawny Kitean, and probably jump started one of my sexual turn-ons...but I’ll get to that later.

Watching it now, I have to report that Witchboard does not hold up as well as I thought it would.  The film is populated by some wretched male actors--the two leads, who we’re supposed to be treating as the protagonists, are selfish douchenozzles who emote woodenly, and the characters surrounding them are one dimensional jokes.  It could easily lose a half hour, including an entire subplot about a cop who wants to be a magician.  It’s awkwardly paced, and contains ‘twists’ that are badly handled and make no sense.  This experience makes me actively wonder if I overestimated Kevin S. Tenney as a director overall...Hell, I’m almost afraid to revisit what is probably his masterpiece, Night of the Demons.

What charm the film has lies in its female actors--not just Kitean, but Kathleen Wilhoite, who plays the small role of New Wave Valley Girl Medium Zarabeth.  Wilhoite is a comic relief/designated victim character which should annoy me to no end (her ‘psychic humor’ came close to making me want to punch her), but she brings a real laid-back energy to a film where the two leads leech all the fun out of this flick.  And while I don’t think Kitean was ever going to win an Oscar (or, more appropriately after seeing her shower scene, a Golden Globe--I’m going to drive this joke into the ground...), she has a charisma that shines through even when she doesn’t quite sell her sudden personality changes.  To be fair, there’s not much to her character--she’s there to be acted upon, not to act--but she does what she can with what little she has.

...I should probably also mention her far-too-short ‘possessed by an axe murdering sorcerer’ scene at the very end.  She’s genuinely great in that scene, and it makes me curious to see the scene without Tenney’s overmodulation of her voice.  Plus she’s dressed in a black men’s suit, a dress shirt and tie and looks spectacular.  Seeing this scene for the first time made me have a perchance for women in suits that influence me to this day.  So women, if you wanted to know how to dress to turn me on...now you know.

I’m hesitant to recommend this now that I’ve viewed it with fresh eyes.  I know that critic William Bibbiani recommends this whenever the Ouija movies come up, but I think that says more about the Ouija movies than about this one.  Of course, if you think Tawny Kitean was the height of 80‘s sexiness, then this film will satisfy.  Use your discretion.

You can still head over to my Twitter Page to vote on tomorrow’s Halloween Horrorfest Movie of the Day.  We’re only a few scant days to the finish line, so your chances to dictate my fate are diminishing.  There’s even a choice you can make if you want to hurt me emotionally!

P.S.--Here's the cover art for a later video release in Britian...is it just me, or was the artist trying to convince us Karen Gillan was somehow involved with this film--a full year before she was born?  That would've been spooky....