Phantom of the Mall: Eric’s Revenge - 1989 (Movie Review)

What do you get when a group of nobodies set out to adapt Gaston Leroux’s seminal tale of stalker love using late 80’s mall culture?

A film Efilmcritic.com called, “Worse than Montezuma’s Revenge.”

Let’s discuss.

Phantom of the Mall: Eric’s Revenge is a 1989 slasher / teen mall movie mash-up brought to us by director Richard Friedman and writers Scott Schneid, Frederick R. Ulrich, and Tony Michelman. If you recognize those names you are a liar, because I don’t think their own mother’s would recognizer them. I thought for a second that they were all Alan Smithy type pseudonyms, but no…

These guys didn’t do much before a since. I mean, their main credits are for Friday the 13th the series. Don’t get me wrong, I am with the loud majority who think that show didn’t get a fair shake, but if that’s your main credit—I don’t think you should be making a motion picture.

Oh yeah, and did you notice?

Three flipping writers.

What do we always say class? More than 2 writers is guaranteed catastrophe.

That being said, this movie is an absolute blast!

The movie focuses on Melody, a young woman picking up a summer job at the bequest of her friend, Susie. Melody has spent the last year isolated following the tragic death of her boyfriend Mark in a fire. A fire which took place on the same location of the new mall. As she battles with the depression caused by customer service and grief, strange things start happening. Anyone who gets in her way tends to disappear and gifts begin showing up in her locker. These gifts are eerily specific to Melody and Mark’s love story. With the help of a local reporter, she finds that there was much more to the fire than she first thought and the conspiracy runs deep beneath the mall. Will she be able to solve the mystery of the phantom, or will she just be another body left in the wake of Mark’s Revenge?

Let’s be real. This movie is bad, and the plot is a poorly performed homage to The Phantom of the Opera. The writing is disjointed and hamfisted in equal parts. No one in this movie acts like a normal human being, but by God—What a cast!

While the film’s lead Kari Whitman didn’t become a big star, almost everyone else in this movie did.

Look at this lineup:

Kelly Rutherford, Morgan Fairchild, Gregory Scott Cummins, Ken Foree, Rob Estes, Pauley Shore, and the most interesting man in the world, Jonathan Goldsmith.

This movie has an almost impossible to replicate mix of has beens and yet to be’s.

Rob Estes was a regular on the original Melrose Place and went on to star in the criminally underrated pulp crime series, Silk Stalkings, before launching an all out prolific film and television career. He really should have been the star of this movie, because it was obvious that he was a step above the lead actress in the chops category and their scenes together were painful.

The biggest WTF moment was seeing a pre-Wiez Pauly Shore acting like a normal human person. In the 90’s, Pauly Shore was a kind of mythical creature prancing around on MTV and releasing movies that shouldn’t have succeeded, but somehow all became hits. We’re talking 1992’s Encino Man, 1993’s Son in Law, and 1994’s In The Army Now. Don’t get me wrong, I love those movies—but they aren’t good and never were. It was wild to see Shore acting like a human and even wilder that he wasn’t terrible. He was a perfectly serviceable supporting actor.

There’s really not much to say about this movie.

The special effects are fairly awful, with Mark’s burned face looking more like the missing link than an actual burn victim.

The music is laugh out loud bad.

The film is a mess of cliches and stereotypes of the slasher genre, but somehow comes off as likable. I mean, you can tell they tried.

But hey, it was shot at the same mall as 1986’s Chopping Mall. So, it’s got that going for it.

I watched the Scream Factory remaster and it looked and sounded fantastic. They did an incredible job and this print is what is available currently on Shudder.

So grab a drink or a joint, gather up some friends, and have a good laugh at this stupid movie.

You’ll thank me later.