Witchcraft V

The fifth installment in the low budget Troma released film series, Witchcraft. The first movie seem too mediocre to justify making more of them. What’s even more Interesting is that none of these sequels are actually in anyway sequels in name alone. Technically, each movie in some fashion follows the life of the Warlock, William, so they are keeping with the same OK story. In the first movie he born as the spawn of two evil witches and was just a pawn to move the story. In the second, he was a teenager discovering what he was put on this planet to do. In the third and forth the character becomes fully develop as he becomes an adult and a layer who seems to be attracted to cases that can only be explained by supernatural means.

Now, William returns again (played by a different actor than the third and forth). Once again his status as a Warlock  attracts evil who wants to use him to hunt down some people to send them to hell.

In my opinion, they should have stopped the film series at number three. None of the movies are amazing, they all have a decent story that seems to fall flat when laid out on screen. I give an A for the effort of the filmmakers who did a so-so job making these low budget features, but for Witchcraft four, whatever…magic they are doing to make the films decent, is not working. This would have been the time to stop, but I guess the the movies are cheap enough to make a profit over and over to keep going.

So, slightly different in tone , Witchcraft five is now becoming the horror film I’ve somewhat expected the film series to be. Rather than the focus the other movies had on The Warlock using his connection to the supernatural to solve a legal case or something like that (which was growing on me). In this movie, a being from hell uses the Warlock as a tool and makes him do things under his spell he does not even realize he’s doing. It’s not scary, but the vibe is more horror related.

The only thing about the Witchcraft series that seems to get better is the nudity. The story has always been interesting with a production that tells it in a stale way, but I’ve always given a little more credit to the filmmakers who seem to be doing the best they can with what they got. Number four, however did not have the same story or production quality of the three that came before it. Five is going down the same route as four, but what it does do better is the needless nudity.

The first movie had none and it was decent. The second was also decent and they made it better with some boob shoots. Then three comes along and the nude shots get way better. Four tries to out do three by adding b-movie’s most famous titties, Julie Strain to the story. Now with five, I love the nude shots and the sex scenes that come with it. The boobs were not famous but looked great. I know, sorry for getting vulgar, but I am seeing a pattern in the witchcraft series and It amuses me. It’s not like it’s a ton of nudity in any of the films. It’s one or two small scenes per film, but it’s definitely like loving a movie more for a song that’s played in the movie over the movie itself no matter how good or bad the movie is.

Another change in the film series is the lean back to satanic magic. Number three and four focus had The Warlock go up against magical themes that seemed to be rooted in Voodoo or Afro-Caribbean culture. This movie goes back to Warlock’s own roots featuring a demon from hell and The Warlock seeking help from the Church in some fashion.

I always felt that the voodoo elements were used as a way to work with the films production budget. Voodoo is not the type of magic that really needs that much special effects to work out.

Number five’s move back towards satanic rituals does allow for the film to add more sex scenes (and rock and roll as a stereotypes  of satanic culture), and the sex scenes do up the likability of this one as two to four mostly just had hot shots of nice boobs, while five goes one step further.  It’s like the filmmakers and the producers wanted to sell the Witchcraft series  as part of the Skinamax Culture that was popular at the time.

Having a more horror based theme does add to not needing a lot of special effects, but you will notice a number of on camera effects being used (A number of which feel like Troma Stock go tos).

Overall, despite the naked sex scene combo that this movie brings in order to make it better than the ones that came before it, I’m still going with Witchcraft three being the money shot and the series should have ended with Witchcraft Four. Just when I was starting to like where they were going with the character of The Warlock they changes the direction of to something more soft-core porn that messes up the magic.