Nightwish Movie Review

 

I haven't reviewed a movie on this blog in a long time.  Well, I watched Nightwish (1989) yesterday, and now I want to talk about it.

The TL;DR version is that it's weird and recommended (especially if you love Cha'alt)... but don't go in thinking it's going to rock your world.  This is standard B-movie fare.

There's a little bit of From Beyond, Altered States, The Haunting, and probably a half-dozen other movies blended within.  Here's the gist - a team consisting of parapsychology students, their teacher, and his Igor stand-in go to some remote house to study ghosts or aliens or demonic forces.  Wackiness ensues.

There's something going on... something wrong with this area of the desolate location.  I believe I heard animal mutilation, people going crazy, maybe there was a line about bug infestations.  The exposition is kind of blasted at you like a shotgun.

The reasons I liked it are the following...

• One character is like the stereotypical Chad on steroids.  
• There's enough otherworldly color going on to give Dario Argento a run for his money.
• Some nice skin is shown - BOOBS!!!
• A woman orgasmically writhes around a cavern floor surrounded by magenta and chartreuse mist (it's like they recorded it straight from my Cremza'amirikza'am sessions).  
• Badass special effects that were both super cool and utterly gross.
• Cool ideas mashed together... is it ghosts, aliens, demonic forces, or something else?
• Unexpected, but not out of nowhere gonzo-twist ending.  

While Nightwish could have used another editing pass on the script, it did a fine job.  The acting was serviceable.  The girls were cute.  The FX were superb.  It just needed more to push it over the top, either unifying it or making it even more scattershot surreal.  Imagine if this had John Carpenter's flair, or at least one of his epic synthesizer scores!

I happened to buy the new blu-ray disc, but maybe you can watch it for free somewhere?  I'd give it a solid 4 out of 5 stars.

One more awesome thing came from watching Nightwish... while I was thinking of different scenes I could slip into my upcoming Cha'alt marathon session at VENGER CON in 3 weeks, it occurred to me that a checklist would help compile all my GMing notes together in one place.  That would work even better if it contained all the things that go into a Cha'alt adventure or campaign.

Check out the latest update on my SubscribeStar page to see the rough draft.  I'm having an artist work on the revision and when it's finished, it'll be awesome.  Expensive, but awesome...

Your support allows me freedom to work without the fear of losing everything if I'm canceled.  

Happy 4th of July, hoss!  Independence... it's a wonderful thing.

VS