Witchcraft: Evil Encounters

-Reviewed by Skunkape-

aka Witchery aka La Casa 4

Witchcraft(1988)  Directed by Fabrizio Laurenti
Our movie starts with a pregnant witch being chased. The locals, armed with pitchforks and shovels almost get her and with no where left to run, trapped in a hotel hallway, she jumps out the window to her death. While flying through the air the sun reflects off of a crystal pendent she's wearing. When we flash to the future this story has become a local legend called the "Curse of the Witch's Light" and sometimes you can still see that crystal's reflection coming out the window certain times of the day.

Witchcraft has a lot to offer, lets start with its cast. Linda "the Exorcist" Blair, David "Baywatch" Hasselhoff, and Annie "Basket Case 2, Superman 3" Ross. Almost the entire cast seems to be American actors, pretty unusual for a Filmirage production. It would have been nice to see a John Morghen or an Al Cliver fill in some of the smaller roles.  The movie is also pretty gory and has some good production value.

Leslie (Leslie Cumming, whose only other film credit is Killing Birds) is writing a book on the witch's curse and other supernatural stuff. Her boyfriend Gary (Hasselhoff) is there to take photos. Gary's also trying to bust Leslie's cherry every chance he gets but she never even so much as gives him a hand job. But, keeping her virginity comes back to haunt her because witches always need blood from virgins and an evil demon comes out of hell and rapes her. Let that be lesson to all women, put out or you'll just wind up getting raped by one of Satan's goons.

"I do know mouth to mouth."

"What's worse, raped by Satan or the Hoff?"

"I shouldn't have gone ass to mouth!"

Meanwhile Jane Brooks (Blair), also pregnant, is having nightmares about these past occurrences.(Is there a connection to the witch perhaps, DER?) A lady in black is appearing to her and her family. She even sets her parents up with a real estate agent to look at the old cursed hotel, its for sale and they're in the market for such a purchase. We find out later that this lady in black was an old actress who lived in the hotel while preparing for became her final role and turned her into a servant of the witch. Once the agent meets up with the family, they take a boat to the creepy old place.When they arrive the witch kills the captain and un-docks the boat stranding them. The Brooks family find Leslie and Gary hiding out upstairs and once they realize the danger they're all in, they decide to team up and use all Leslie's knowledge of the occult to fight back. Who ever dubbed Leslie by the way did a piss poor job, she sounds like a valley girl on quaaludes.

"No more Alice Cooper before bed!"

"Let me see your knuckle ball."

The first house guest to go is Mrs. Brooks (Ross), due to her greed. What! Does the witch have morals or something? She is sucked down a dumbwaiter, once at the bottom her lips are sewn shut with a needle and thread and then she's hung upside down in the chimney. Later that day, it gets cold and her family inadvertently lights her on fire. The witch kills the two real estate agents next, they go upstairs to knock boots and were chosen because of their sinful lust. Again with the morals, doesn't this make a knocked up satanic witch a bit of a hypocrite judging all these people. Tommy, Jane's little brother (another atrociously dubbed character) has a sesame street recorder and it's playing out all sorts of satanic chants. As for Jane (Blair) after some voodoo ritual she becomes possessed or should I say repossessed? And now she's doing all the witch's dirty work.

"I need to check you for fleas."

"I hate being typecast."

C is for Coven, it's good enough for me!

There are an insane amount of unintentional laughs throughout this movie. It's not a classic by any means but offers a little something for everybody, the Hoff, gore, mystery, boobs. In Italy Evil Dead was released as La Casa and Evil Dead 2 as La Casa 2.  What we know as Ghosthouse by Umberto Lenzi was released in Italy as La Casa 3 to cash in on the success of the Evil Dead series and this movie was released as La Casa 4.

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7/10 ON THE CULT-O-METER

Theater of Guts

Tribute Trailer

it's Suspiria,the Hoff, Exorcist, and Sesame Street all in a Blender

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