3/10/09: Simon, King of the Witches (1971)

Deadlines loom, so we’re farming out today’s entry—which should be a link, but David T. Lindsay’s DVD review of Simon, King of the Witches isn’t available online. It ran in Atlanta, Georgia’s fine Stomp & Stammer, to which we also contribute. We’ll also note that the magazine allows diverse political views. It’s probably no coincidence that the publications that print people like us are doing okay, while the more blandly predictable alt-weeklies are floundering.

In that same spirit, we’ll also point out (again) that David Lindsay is a typically neglected right-wing film critic, and there’s a lot to enjoy in his archives of current film reviews. It’s all as snappy as what follows:

Looking more like John C. Holmes than Maurice Evans on Bewitched, Andre Prine begins with a soliloquy: “My name is Simon, and I live in a storm drain.” Even a delusional warlock has more scruples than the twisted hedonistic hipsters of the time. Selling sacred talismans, Simon is arrested for vagrancy after a dalliance with the DA’s daughter, but finds hustlers and dopers see him as something of a counter-cultural hitman to settle scores and save them from their own misdeeds. He even sees through Wicca and tries to “liberate” the subservient men!

It’s the first time that I’d ever heard mention of “priapsia” as a life-threatening condition—nowadays, it’s a medical breakthrough if it lasts more than four hours! A great attack on all that hippie crap, this movie would make the perfect complement for an evening of ’70s viewing along with Electra Glide In Blue and DeathMaster with Robert Quarry.

Make it your own: Simon, King of the Witches came out last year on DVD, and that was one overdue release. Prine shows up amongst the extras to offer some good-natured thoughts, and the print looks a lot better than the mold-encrusted one they ran at a Southern drive-in back in 1983.

 

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