Review Detail

9.3 9 10
FanFix November 08, 2013 7373
Overall rating
 
9.4
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
10.0
The Phantom Strikes delivers what I wanted The Phantom (1996) to be in the first place. It was the 1996 movie that introduced me to the character and made me a lifelong fan or "Phan" of Lee Falk's and Ray Moore's creation. When I was a kid and watched this I adored it and, in many ways, it was The Phantom movie (along with the Green Hornet radio show on old cassette tapes) that made me love the pulp genre.

As an adult, my problems with the original cut are not many... but DRAX is the absolute worst... the overperformance of Treat Williams, takes me out of the film. What this edit does is remove a lot of Williams' manic dialogue and actually makes him more of a credible villain, closer to the campy but dangerous portrayal of Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor in Superman: The Movie. Transferring to black and white is simply inspired as it makes the film feel like an update on an old movie serial and also respects the original comic strip's roots. What the film tried to do in 1996 was adapt the first 2 Phantom strips: "The Singh Brotherhood" and "The Skyband" and what this edit does, by toning down the Drax character, it allows those narratives, and the film's overall charm, to better shine through. By removing the origin at the beginning and removing the 20th Phantom (Kit's father) sequences, the film becomes much tighter. Overall, this edit delivers a much more enjoyable experience and it actually looks better in B&W.

If I have one criticism it would be that Drax's "It's Beautiful/Show Me the Power" line should have been removed during the museum scene where the 2 skulls cut a hole in the map. Any line where Drax gets manic and high-pitched just makes him oafish. Even still, this is the definitive version of the film and the editor should be very proud of himself that he has given Phantom fans a near masterpiece. This edit will be rewatched many times, no doubt.

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