And Evil Shall Appear as a Schoolgirl: Eko Eko Azarak: Wizard of Darkness (1995)

Eko Eko Azarak: Wizard of Darkness (Japan, 1995)
Rating: ***1/2
Starring: Kimika Yoshino, Miho Kanno, Shu-Ma

Misa Kurio (Kimika Yoshino) is the new transfer student of a local high school; she's stern and particularly mature, with a quirky skill of being that effective in using black magic. Her talent for the dark arts becomes an interest for a particular group of peers whose teacher is making their lives miserable, so they pressure Kurio into casting a curse upon him.

Though it worked, a jealous classmate, who also practices black magic, accuses her of being responsible for a series of strange deaths occurring all over the city, even more so when said teacher ended up dead the next day. Oddly enough, the occurrences of these deaths did take a curious pattern, that of a pentagram, so Kuroi is having a hard time convincing anyone that her magic is not to blame. Things go for the worse when she, along with these students, ends up mysteriously locked inside their school one night, and they're either getting murdered or killed in bizarre and overly brutal manner by someone behind a cloak and hiding in a candle-lit room.

Eventually, Kuroi learns that there might be the something more diabolical than a mere massacre happening here. Something that, if completed, might bring forth a force too powerful to apprehend and defeat.

Being the first of five movies and a basis for a TV series, Wizard of Darkness (1995) is one supernatural slasher that gets really weird with its plotting, dabbling on the occult and a possible apocalyptic end to our world as a backdrop to its teen massacres. Everything about the first half reeks of bodycount familiarities as one highschooler to the next are systematically getting killed off, all the while exploiting the usual slasher clichés including a variation of the 'sex equals death' formula (done here in exploit, featuring a lesbian student-teacher affair), teens doing stupid decision resulting to their deaths, and multiple plot twists and red herrings to keep the killer's identity a mystery.

It can get pretty cheesy in its execution, especially once the horrors of the demonic and Satanic start to take over the rest of the plot, though this does make the movie novel enough with its gimmicks of using voodoo dolls and Devil juju as stand in for most of its stalk-and-slash action, as well as the otherworldly goal of the villain for the killing spree to begin with.

In terms of budget, the film definitely shows how little is used, but otherwise it befits the overall tone of the film; The single setting fair quite well for the massacre and some good camera work has us sweeping through the empty corridors with ghostly visage and a bit of gloomy atmosphere. The murders are creatively simple yet bloody enough to satisfy fans of dead teenager films, and the climactic last act is rather ambitious as it involves the arrival of a powerful deity. Around this part, the use of cheap CG did come off rather distracting, but thankfully this only lasted for a few moments, thus only a minor drawback.

If there is a flaw to point out, the victims being slaughtered are not that developed as most of the focus was on Kimika Yoshino's Kuroi character and her enigmatic coolness. This leaves almost everybody else disposable, serving little purpose but to pump up the kill count as they panic and scream at something they cannot understand. Yes, they're scared, and this would be a common reaction anyone would have if everybody else seem to be dying off through impossible accidents, but I really do wish they did more than be mere victims. Still, the lead heroine is pretty far out; she's serious, but not too hardened, making her likable enough to root for all the way.

In conclusion, Wizard of Darkness (1995) is one obscure title that's a must-check for slasher fans; if you think Japan's first standard slasher Evil Dead Trap (1988) was strange enough to satisfy your bodycounting urges, wait til' you see this one!

Bodycount:

1 female had her head crushed by a falling metal girder
1 male mentioned killed in car accident
1 female drowned
3 males and 2 females slaughtered off camera
1 female decapitated by a sliding window pane
1 male trips down the stairs and hits his head on fall
1 female slashed dead with a box cutter
1 male had his throat cut with box cutter
1 male had his throat cut with box cutter
1 female found crucified to a table with a throat cut, bled to death
1 female falls back-first unto an axe
1 female had her face torn open, killed
Total: 16