1991 American TV series or program
Cast a Deadly Spell (1991) is a horror-fantasy detective television film[1] with Fred Ward, Julianne Moore, David Warner, and Clancy Brown.[2][3] It was directed by Martin Campbell, produced by Gale Anne Hurd, and written by Joseph Dougherty. The original music score was composed by Curt Sobel. A sequel entitled Witch Hunt was released in 1994, with Dennis Hopper playing Ward's role of Harry Philips Lovecraft. (The character's name, as well as a number of plot elements, make reference to the work of weird fiction writer Howard Philips Lovecraft.)
Plot
In an alternative 1948 Los Angeles, magic and mythological creatures are common. The protagonist, Harry Lovecraft, a detective, refuses its use. He does still accept wealthy widower's Amos Hackshaw job offer to locate the powerful grimoire known as the Necronomicon, which Hackshaw had stolen. Lovecraft meets Hackshaw's cosseted teenage daughter, Olivia.
Following a clue, Lovecraft goes to the Dunwich nightclub and finds an old acquaintance named Connie Stone now performs there as a singer. Here he also meets Harry Bordon, a cruel mobster who also covets the grimoire. Bordon has already murdered Mickey Locksteader in a fruitless attempt to have the Necronomicon for himself.
The next morning, Lovecraft gets fingered by attack by a demon summoned up with magic, but escapes. He locates Lilly, alias Larry Willis, the ex-lover of murder victim Mickey, who has the grimoire, depicted as a crossdresser or trans woman. An animated gargoyle bursts in and kills Willis/Lilly, but Lovecraft escapes with the Necronomicon.
Bordon, and it emerges, also Hackshaw and Connie all had plans to use the grimoire to summon up one of the Old Ones, in order to gain awesome power. The summoning ritual would the unwilling offering-up the "virgin" Olivia. Connie shoots and kills the mobster Bordon before the ritual begins. The Old One appears, eats Hackshaw and vanishes back into the Earth. The ritual failed as Olivia had lost her virginity recently. Before Connie is arrested for killing Bordon, she and Lovecraft share a kiss. He leaves with the Necronomicon, confident that his aversion to magic will override any temptation to use the book's dark powers.
Critical reception
In The New York Times John J. O'Connor said that the "new HBO Pictures production that can be seen tonight at 8 on the pay-cable service, gives the city a spin that should make even its most jaded observers sit up, chuckle and wince.... Mining familiar formulas, Mr. Dougherty's Cast a Deadly Spell is engagingly different and special."[2]
In the Chicago Tribune Rick Kogan said, "I've had some very strange times in Los Angeles, spotted some very strange people. But none of what I've done or seen in that town can compare with what happens to H. Phillip Lovecraft in a special effects-filled and wildly successful original Home Box Office movie... Casting its own spell, this movie invigorates."[4]
Sequel
HBO produced a sequel, Witch Hunt, with Dennis Hopper playing Lovecraft in place of Ward. Witch Hunt takes place in the 1950s during the Second Red Scare, with magic substituted for communism. Many characters from Cast a Deadly Spell reappear with different backstories.
