The Phantom (1996) – Review

OK, for a start, I don’t know who the Hell thought “Slam Evil” would be a viable tagine for a tentpole superhero – it would be like Tim Burton releasing his Batman adaptation with “Punch Crime” unironically plastered all over the poster – but I suppose it makes a certain amount of sense when you consider that 1996’s The Pantom was supposed to be a cynicism-free love letter to the sort of pulp, boys-own, adventure stories that you’d get in the 30s. In fact, the 1990s were rotten with Hollywood’s attempts to breathe new life into defiantly old-school crime fighters, and yet while such attempts as Dick Tracy, The Shadow, Tarzan And The Lost City and, yes, The Phantom did their best to invoke a simpler time, most fell before a foe they simply couldn’t defeat: tepid box office.
Possibly one of the more infamous of these is Simon Wincer’s The Phantom, a movie that fully embraced a sense of swashbuckling derring-do while expecting us to buy Billy Zane rumbling in the jungle in a bright purple onesie. To be honest, it failed – but like a lot of failures from that wonky period in cinematic superhero history, it’s still kind of facinating to watch.

It’s 1938 and after a quick prologue that establishes that the lineage of The Phantom first started in the 16th century after some fluff about a kid bring taken in by a mysterious Asian tribe after his family was obliterated by pirates known as the Sengh Brotherhood, we zip ahead to find a group of no good criminals led by the amoral Quill scouring the jungles with the intent of some good, old fashioned grave robbing. However, while his goons are trawling through old skeletons, Quill is searching for one of the fabled Skulls Of Touganda which are rumoured to contain unbelievable power. However, while he’s surprised by actually discovering one, he’s surprised even more by the arrival of a heroic man clad in a purple cowl and body suit who has come to halt his nefarious deeds. While I’ll freely admit we’d all be surprised as that sight, Quill is extra stunned as he apparently killed this Phantom guy many years before, however, after a brief fight/chase, Quill manages to escape to New York and we get to spend some time with this purple people beater.
His name is Kit Walker and he is the 21st of his family line to take up the mantle of The Phantom which has caused his enemies to believe he is actually immortal, however, while the idiocy of the criminal mind cannot be underestimated, Kit, urged on by the ghost of his father, follows Quill to New York to ensure the skull doesn’t fall into even worse hands.
Those wose hands would belong to power hungry businessman Xander Drax who wants to collect all three skulls and reap the benefits, but while Kit inadvertently reunites with old college flame Diana Palmer who is now a reporter also looking to take down Drax. Thus an adventure begins that will see the couple bounce from New York back to the Bengalla jungle and butt heads with not only Drax, but the newest incarnation of the Sengh Brotherhood. Can The Ghost Who Walks save the day while avoiding heat exhaustion as he “slams evil” in a jungle climate.

I have to be honest, my only real experience with The Phantom was when he popped up in the random line up of that 80s Saturday morning cartoon, Defenders of The Earth alongside Flash Gordon, but obviously I wasn’t taking that as as a launching point for a movie that’s essentially trying to be Indiana Jones in purple spandex. In fact, director Simon Wincer actually went on to direct a bunch of Young Indiana Jones episodes a few years after this, but that doesn’t stop The Phantom getting caught up in an admirable, but flawed attempt to bring back the black and white morals of the old adventure serials of days gone by. The problem is that it’s so enamoured the throwback style it’s trying to nail, it forgets to try and make it play to a modern audience like Speilberg did with Indiana Jones and George Lucas did with Star Wars. The result is something of a hodgepodge that ends up feeling something like a campy television movie that feels like it has the same kind of production values as an episode of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. It’s bizarre that a period piece superhero movie that leaps between the Asian jungle and New York and features countless horse chases, crashing trucks and plane stunts could feel so small, especially with all the visual grand standing that Russell Mulcahy pulled off for around the same amount of money in The Shadow.
The cast gamely attempt to mimic that 30s style of acting into a more modern attempt with varying degrees of success. Zane looks every inch the debonair hero with a foppish fringe for the most part, but even his dashing smile and wry asides can’t compensate that he’s essentially leaping around the jungle in a domino mask and a plum coloured gimp suit.

In comparison, Kirsty Swanson’s female lead and James Remar’s henchmen feel a lot more measured and not too overblown, but this obviously wasn’t a concern for Treat Williams who plays his dastardly schemer like he’s Howard Hughes on the highest point of a codine rip. In fact, between Williams overacting, Zane’s smarm and Catherine Zeta Jones’ pre-Mask Of Zorro vamping, I’m not entirely sure who actually obtained the correct level of camp the film needed, but none of then managed to stop the film feeling weirdly flat. In fact, not even a bug-eyed Patrick McGiohan’s giving his son passive aggressive hero tips from beyond the grave or a brief role for Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as a pirate manage to give the film the boost it needs to rise above the same malady that brought down so many other 90s superhero movies.
The action scenes are similarly devoid of life despite throwing in audacious set pieces that see both the Phantom and Diana leap from a failing bi-plane onto the saddle of a galloping horse, but the effects work frequently lets the side down, negating any legitimately impressive stunt work instant with a single edit to some iffy green screen work. There’s also the feeling that despite the fact the Phantom certainly talks a good fight, he’s certainly no Batman when it comes to prep time and while he flails his way through the latest fight scene, he feels less like a highly trained superhero with the experience of twenty of his ancestors backing him up, and more like a guy randomly chancing his arm and hoping everything turns out alright.

While there’s an argument to be made that it’s impressive that someone took a punt on a Phantom movie to begin with, it simply doesn’t have the visual flare of Dick Tracy, the trippy superpowers of The Shadow or even the scale of The Rocketeer to back it up. Yet another casualty in the great 90s superhero holocaust that saw everyone from Captain America to Spawn crash out spectacularly, The Phantom has the right idea about what needs do, but seemingly has no idea how to actually pull it off on screen other than have a man run around exploding sets in a pair of purple tights. The Ghost Who Walks might want to try and sit down for a bit because his attempts to “slam evil” just simply ain’t doing it.
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