‘The Wraith’ (1986) Review

Reading Time: 11 minutes

Over on Kung Pew Video, I’ve been revisiting the direct-to-video relics that raised us. This week: The Wraith.

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You’ve Never Seen The Wraith?!

Several years ago, one of my best friends and I were talking favorite old movies when he mentioned The Wraith…like I shoulda been familiar with it. But I had no idea what he was talking about. He couldn’t believe it. 

You’ve never seen The Wraith?! You know, cool car, Charlie Sheen, Sherilyn Fenn!?

He made gestures as he said Fenn’s name to emphasize the fact that I’d missed out on something very important. So I made a mental note to check it out and that was that. 

Years later – April of 2020 to be exact – I finally got around to watching it. 

And you know what? I’m glad I missed it. 

A Portal to the Totally Rad 80s

I’m glad I missed it because The Wraith…is awesome. And I thought I’d already seen all the awesome 80s movies. Finding gems like this decades later and being able to enjoy ‘em like I would have back then is like finding a hundred bucks in an old coat pocket. Like discovering there’s one more piece of birthday cake left. In a way, it’s like a time machine.

A portal to the totally rad 80s. 

You’ve got the fashions, the music, the neon-lit shots, the familiar faces of Charlie Sheen, Sherilyn Fenn, Nick Cassavetes, Clint Howard, and Randy Quaid. You’ve got action, hot cars, the teen drama, and the hokey plot. The Wraith isn’t interested so much in justifying itself as it is in just being a vibe. It’s the kind of movie you just want to hang out in and get to know these quirky characters. It’s one of those movies you want to watch over and over again but never want to end. 

If I had seen this as a kid, I would totally have thought the setting was exotic and cool and would have wanted to visit, even though looking back on it as an adult, I know the setting isn’t that different from the small town I grew up in. But I still think it’s kinda cool and I’d love to visit it and hang out with these goofy characters. 

Side note: I like to tie movies together, and from the first time I saw The Wraith, I thought it shared DNA with another favorite teen movie of mine that came out a year later: Can’t Buy Me Love. Turns out, both of these movies were filmed in and around Tuscon, Arizona, and both shot scenes in the famous airplane graveyard outside of town. 

So in my head canon, they now officially exist in the same cinematic universe. 

THE BACK-OF-THE-VHS 

Charlie Sheen plays the mysterious Jake Kesey, who rides into town on a dirt bike at the start of the movie and quickly catches the attention of the beautiful Keri Johnson (played by Sherilynn Fenn) and local bully Packard Walsh (played by Nick Cassavetes).

Packard and his gang of thugs are basically car thieves who force hapless motorists to race for pink slips. But the races are just for show, because Packard’s gang is getting the car one way or the other. Threats and intimidation are the gang’s stock in trade. 

But soon after Jake arrives, a mysterious black sports car appears out of nowhere and begins to pick Packard’s gang off one by one. 

All the Genres

Mixing multiple movie genres including sci-fi, fantasy, horror, the western, and action, The Wraith, at its heart, it’s basically a revenge flick beneath a glossy coat of 80s pop. It’s what you’d get if you threw Mad Max, High Plains Drifter, MTV, and Saved by the Bell in a blender together. It’s quirky, sexy, and it manages to craft a world that feels big and glamorous and fantastic – despite its small town desert setting.

And while the identity of the driver of the black sports car is kept a mystery for most of the movie, it should be pretty obvious who it is if you’re paying even a little attention. 

Spoiler Alert. This is an old movie, but I’m giving you the heads up, spoilers ahead. 

We find out through flashbacks that Packard and his gang intruded on Keri and her boyfriend Jamie Hankins while the two are in the middle of some hanky panky. The jealous Packard kills Jamie, but Keri is knocked unconscious and doesn’t witness the attack. 

The plot of The Wraith is…well, it’s pretty goofy. 

Small town car thieves, ghostly supercars, an entire town under the thumb of one young thug…none of it seems even remotely plausible. And where the Turbo Interceptor comes from is never really explained. The identity of the driver is revealed to be the reincarnated Jamie Hankins, but the mythology of the supercar and the forces behind its driver’s return are left pretty ambiguous. 

A Tale of Two Posters

And I can’t really say it makes a whole heck of a lot of sense. But I don’t think it made sense to the filmmakers either. Or the marketing department, at the very least.

Like I said, there are horror, sci-fi, action, and western elements to The Wraith, and even though it’s never really scary and the movie never quite capitalizes on the science fiction aspects, the genre blending somehow adds to the fun and charm of the whole thing. 

In some countries, The Wraith was released as Black Moon Rising: Part 2, suggesting it was a sequel to the unrelated 1986 John Carpenter-penned film Black Moon Rising starring Tommy Lee Jones and Linda Hamilton. Which is just bonkers to me, because the two films were produced by entirely different production companies. 

And if you look at the posters designed for the film, it seems clear that the people marketing it had no idea how to sell the movie. One poster has Sheen and Fenn hanging out with Cassavetes and one of his gang members like they are all friends in some teen adventure movie, while the other makes it look like some kind of time travel Back to the Future rip-off or something.  

So, yeah. The Wraith isn’t the most coherent movie. But you know what? It doesn’t really matter, because like I said, this movie is almost all vibes.

The Actors

Oddly enough, Sheen is barely in the movie. But when he does appear, he and Fenn have great chemistry. I kinda wish we saw more of his character in this, because he’s got a calm, cool vibe to him that so many 80s hero characters have, and Sheen just pulls it off effortlessly. 

Fenn is gorgeous as always, and she has a unique charm that works here despite her limited range as an actor. I can’t imagine another actress in the role of Keri. 

Nick Cassavetes is just having a blast playing the villain here. His portrayal of the villain Packard Walsh is so over-the-top, and the character is right up there with Ben Gazzarra’s Brad Wesley from Road House when it comes to ridiculous 80s villains. 

Randy Quaid plays the local sheriff trying to figure out who’s bumping off Packard’s gang one by one. Believe it or not, Quaid kinda gives a grounded performance here. I mean, grounded for Randy Quaid. He’s still Randy Quaid, but he manages to keep a straight enough face to pull off the competent, hard-nosed Sheriff Loomis. Minus a few pretty hilarious lines of dialogue. 

After Quaid, there are loads of fun side characters in this, mostly consisting of Packard’s gang members. 

Clint Howard plays Rughead, the gang’s sort of mad scientist mechanic who keeps all of Packard’s stolen cars running in tip-top shape. His performance is as out there and goofy as you’d expect a Clint Howard performance to be, and he’s a lot of fun to watch. 

 

David Sherrill and Jamie Bozian play Skank and Gutterboy, and these two doofuses practically steal the movie. Skank’s always snorting or drinking something to get high, but not the usual stuff. Not this guy. His favorites include spray lubricants and hydraulic fluid. 

His reactions when he takes a hit are about what you would expect. 

Mathew Barry plays Billy Hankins, the brother of Jamie. Hankins and Keri work together at the local burger joint, which often puts him at odds with Cassavette’s Packard.  

Billy’s not tough or cool but he’s also not your typical helpless nerd, and Barry strikes the perfect balance here, rendering one of the more relatable and sympathetic characters in the whole movie. 

Chris Nash plays Minty, and he isn’t given much to do before he’s offed by the Dodge Interceptor. But I thought he was worth mentioning because, apparently he was named after Emil Minty, the actor that played the Feral Kid from The Road Warrior aka Mad Max 2.

The Influence of Mad Max

And speaking of Mad Max, remember when I said that The Wraith was a mix between George Miller’s movies and High Plains Drifter? Apparently, the Mad Max movies were a legitimate influence on The Wraith, to the extent that director Mike Marvin went through Miller’s movies frame by frame and emulated his style while editing the car chase scenes. 

And Mike Marvin was a good student. Because the races and chases and action scenes are great and so much fun to watch, and the sports cars all add a whole other layer of cool to the movie–especially the Dodge Interceptor. 

The Soundtrack

And driving it all is a killer 80s soundtrack featuring songs from Ozzie Osbourne, Robert Palmer, Bonnie Tyler, Billy Idol, Motley Crue, and Stan Bush–the man who gave us “The Touch” from the Transformers: The Movie soundtrack and “Fight to Survive” from Bloodsport, among others. It’s hard to imagine a more 80s soundtrack, but The Wraith also features an original synth score composed by Michael Hoenig and J. Peter Robinson. 

Hoenig would go on to score another favorite sci-fi movie of mine: Class of 1999. I’ll review that eventually, but meanwhile I have a review for the sequel you should check out if you like those movies. 

Robinson scored several other movies including Cocktail, Wayne’s World, and a personal favorite: Blind Fury with Rutger Hauer. I’ll be reviewing that one too eventually. 

Without the soundtrack, I don’t think The Wraith would work nearly as well. Even though I didn’t grow up with this movie and have only seen it a few times, I already love the music. I’d even put it up there with some of my favorite movie soundtracks like Pump Up the Volume and Rad. I have a playlist on Spotify I listen to with most of the songs in it, and they just perfectly capture the tone and spirit of the movie. 

A Movie With Heart

Now it’s easy to watch a movie like The Wraith and say “They don’t make ‘em like they used to”, but it’s a lot harder to say why. Sometimes it’s easier to just point at certain movies and say “This is what I’m talking about”.

The Wraith just perfectly encapsulates movie making in the 80s. The eccentricities, the audacity behind some of these high-concept plots, and the absolute straight-faced sincerity that they were made with. 

The Wraith is ridiculous, but it’s also got heart. 

That last scene when Jake gives Billy the Dodge and Billy realizes he’s his brother reincarnated? Man, cheesy movie or not, that scene gets me every time I watch this. And it all works because the filmmakers believed in what they were doing. For whatever reason during this decade, they felt free to be audacious, to be silly, to imagine big, to lead with their hearts, and maybe most importantly…to have fun. 

Bonding Over Hardship

Okay, after writing and recording this, I rewatched some of the extras that came with the Vestron Video BluRay of the movie that I have, and I felt like this was worth adding. 

David Sherrill and Jamie Bozian (the guys that play Skank and Gutterboy) have a commentary track on this release, and they talked at length about the lifelong friendships they made working on this film. The shoot was less than a month long, but it sounds like it wasn’t always an easy one. The crew dealt with weather extremes at both ends–super hot and super cold. Sherrill wore a blue jean vest for the whole movie and was either always sunburned or freezing cold for the night shots.

Because this wasn’t a big budget film, there were some production woes as well. 

Everyone interviewed in the extras talks about how terrible the cars were to drive. Several called ‘em death traps. And tragically, after principal filming wrapped, a cameraman lost his life while filming one of the high speed chase sequences. I can’t remember who, but someone in the crew suggested the accident was caused by a producer cutting corners to save money. Who knows. It’s sad and director Marvin even has a hard time talking about the movie because of this accident. 

But I think these hardships also bonded the cast and crew. The cast was mostly young and it sounds like they spent a lot of time hanging out when they weren’t filming. 

The Depp Connection

Sherrill and Bozian both starred in episodes of 21 Jump Street after this movie came out, and they talk about hanging out with Johnny Depp and Sherrilyn Fenn in Vancouver where the show was being filmed. 

Oh, yeah, side note: according to Bozian and Sherrill, Depp, who was a nobody at the time (their words, not mine), was constantly on the set of The Wraith because he was dating Fenn at the time. Sherrill says he didn’t care much for Depp at the time, but the two squashed whatever beef they had with each other on the set of Jump Street. 

Sherrill and Bozian also talk about them getting into a huge brawl in a 7/11 parking lot with some local who helped himself to a bite of a burrito one of the actors was eating. Apparently Griffin O’Neil (son of Ryan and brother of Tatum), who played Oggie, wasn’t having any of it, and went at the guy. The guy grabbed a baseball bat from his truck, and hit O’Neil across the back. And then all hell broke loose. Sherrill and Bozian affectionately refer to O’Neil as a bulldog, implying he didn’t take crap off of anyone. 

The two actors also had a lot of nice things to say about Clint Howard, Fenn, Nick Cassavettes, Randy Quaid, Matthew Barry, Charlie Sheen, and stunt coordinator Buddy Joe Hooker, referring to Hooker as the hero of the movie for what he was able to accomplish with the junky equipment he was given to work with. 

Both actors said Sheen was very fun to be around and was extremely funny off-camera and that they’ve been friends ever since. They also seemed completely enamored with Fenn and only had the best things to say about filming with her on The Wraith and hanging out with her in Vancouver while shooting Jump Street. Sherrill called Howard a consummate pro and said he’s a much better actor than he would have anyone believe. The two had very similar things to say about Quaid. Adding that both Quaid and Howard are super good dudes. 

Neither had anything bad to say about any of the cast or crew.

Lifelong Friends

Clint Howard has his own little interview segment in the extras, and he also talks affectionately of all of the cast and crew and says that they have all pretty much stayed close over the years. Sherrill and Bozian actually moved to be near each other in North Carolina and remain close friends to this day. 

And I think this just speaks to why The Wraith has a certain feel to it and remains such a beloved film. It seems like movies that are hard to make often bond actors and crew together. And I think those relationships carried over to the performances and enhanced the realism of a movie whose premise is anything but. 

I think it’s why it has a cult following and why I feel this tug to…jump into the movie and hang with these people. You can feel that camaraderie and brotherhood in every scene, and hearing the guys talk so warmly about each other just makes me love The Wraith even more. 

Discovering a Gem

I missed out on nearly 40 years of watching and enjoying The Wraith. Quoting it with friends. Catching the references. Being in on the jokes. 

But you know what? 

I’m fine with that. Because instead of growing up with it, I got to discover it. 

And that’s getting rarer and rarer these days. 

Like finding a tape in the bottom of a trunk that you’d never seen before…
and realizing it’s been there the whole time, just waiting for you to find it, to pop it in the VCR, and join the adventure of a lifetime. 

And every time I get to experience that with one of these older movies, I’m transported to another time and place, and I’m reminded of the power of imagination and, honestly, just fun. 

And I remember why I fell in love with movies in the first place. 

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Kung Pew Video is where I dig into the neon-drenched, straight-to-VHS corner of film history. New episodes weekly. Be kind. Subscribe. See ya in the VHS wasteland.