Necromancer (1988)

_**Better titled “The Sorceress” or “Demon of Vengeance”**_

After a horrible crime, a young woman at a SoCal university (Elizabeth Kaitan) consults a practicing witch (Lois Masten Ewing) and the perpetrators start dying one by one.

"Necromancer" (1988) combines the plot of “I Spit on your Grave” (1978) with the tone of “Christine” (1983) and the deal-with-the-devil angle of the future “Shock ‘Em Dead” (1991), not to mention the colorful effects, which smack of (fun) 80’s cheese. It lacks the grim seriousness of “I Spit” and isn’t as effective as the latter two, but it has its entertaining moments.

It tries to be a serious movie about the crime in question, and is to a point, yet this is contrasted by the over-the-top black magic, which is shown right out of the gate. Meanwhile the killer doppelganger angle is reminiscent of “From Within” (2008). The most glaring issue is that the title is a misnomer since no soul is culled from the dead.

Elizabeth Kaitan is winsome on the female front. You might remember her as Robin from “Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood,” which was made the same year. On the other side of the gender spectrum, Stan Hurwitz is formidable as the main antagonist while John Tyler works well as the girl’s noble beau, a musician.

The movie runs 1 hour, 28 minutes, and was shot at Pepperdine University on Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, California.

GRADE: B-/C+