Simon, King Of The Witches (film)
Encyclopedia
Simon, King of the Witches is a 1971
film directed by Bruce Kessler
and starring Andrew Prine
. Not technically a straight horror film
as the title might suggest, it also falls in the realm of campy
and psychedelia. It is considered a cult classic
.
ian, is on a quest to become a god. Simon lives in a sewer, selling his charms and potions for money, when he is befriended by a young male prostitute named Turk (George Paulsin). Turk introduces Simon to his world of drugs, wild parties, and hysterical Wicca
n rituals featuring a goat and Andy Warhol
star Ultra Violet
. Death and mayhem ensue, along with romance for Simon with the district attorney's daughter (Brenda Scott).
sex orgy film cashing in on Charles Manson
, seriously hurt the film at the box office. The film is practically bloodless, has some nudity (which, again against the norm, actually serves a purpose in the story) but no explicit sex and no parallels whatsoever with Manson. Like many other more eccentric 70's low budget genre films, Simon has become a cult film over the years, albeit an extremely marginal one.
There was also a paperback novelization of Simon by Baldwin Hills, more than likely a pen name, which took the satirical camp of the film one step further into full-on absurd comedy. Long since out of print, the book comes up occasionally on eBay
and online used book stores.
genre films of the late 60's and early 70's is the script, which is far more literate and versed in the esoteric than the norm, both offering new twists to and poking fun at the clichés of the genre. The character of Simon Sinestrari was reputedly based on the public persona of the ceremonial magician and occult author Poke Runyon, a well-known figure in the Southern California
Neopagan
scene at that time. Runyon himself acknowledges the likeness, and has said that the only major inaccuracy is that he "never lived in a sewer".
Simon is also much more of a satire
than a horror film
. Several scenes are obviously meant to be taken as black comedy, a fact that tends to escape traditional horror fans.
Through all of this, Simon's approach to his magic and the world is nothing short of cynical, and simultaneously practical yet grandiose. He holds absolutely no romanticism at all towards his work and reacts to everything else with laconic amusement.
1971 in film
The year 1971 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*February 8 - Bob Dylan's hour long documentary film, Eat the Document, premieres at New York's Academy of Music...
film directed by Bruce Kessler
Bruce Kessler
Bruce Kessler is a former racing driver from the United States. He entered one World Championship Formula One Grand Prix with a Connaught owned by Bernie Ecclestone, but failed to qualify, although he posted the 21st fastest time of the 28 entrants.Kessler grew up in Beverly Hills, California....
and starring Andrew Prine
Andrew Prine
Andrew Lewis Prine is an American film, stage, and television actor.-Early life and career:Prine was born in Jennings, Florida. After graduation from Andrew Jackson High School in Miami, Prine made his acting debut three years later in an episode of CBS U.S. Steel Hour...
. Not technically a straight horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
as the title might suggest, it also falls in the realm of campy
Camp (style)
Camp is an aesthetic sensibility that regards something as appealing because of its taste and ironic value. The concept is closely related to kitsch, and things with camp appeal may also be described as being "cheesy"...
and psychedelia. It is considered a cult classic
Cult film
A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...
.
Plot
Simon Sinestrari (Andrew Prine), a cynical Ceremonial magicCeremonial magic
Ceremonial magic, also referred to as high magic and as learned magic, is a broad term used in the context of Hermeticism or Western esotericism to encompass a wide variety of long, elaborate, and complex rituals of magic. It is named as such because the works included are characterized by...
ian, is on a quest to become a god. Simon lives in a sewer, selling his charms and potions for money, when he is befriended by a young male prostitute named Turk (George Paulsin). Turk introduces Simon to his world of drugs, wild parties, and hysterical Wicca
Wicca
Wicca , is a modern Pagan religious movement. Developing in England in the first half of the 20th century, Wicca was popularised in the 1950s and early 1960s by a Wiccan High Priest named Gerald Gardner, who at the time called it the "witch cult" and "witchcraft," and its adherents "the Wica."...
n rituals featuring a goat and Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
star Ultra Violet
Ultra Violet (Isabelle Collin Dufresne)
Isabelle Collin Dufresne is a French artist, author and former colleague and superstar of Andy Warhol.-Early life:...
. Death and mayhem ensue, along with romance for Simon with the district attorney's daughter (Brenda Scott).
Cast
- Andrew PrineAndrew PrineAndrew Lewis Prine is an American film, stage, and television actor.-Early life and career:Prine was born in Jennings, Florida. After graduation from Andrew Jackson High School in Miami, Prine made his acting debut three years later in an episode of CBS U.S. Steel Hour...
as Simon Sinestrari - George Paulsin as Turk
- Brenda Scott as Linda
- Gerald York as Hercules
- Norman Burton as Rackum
- William MartelWilliam MartelWilliam Martel was a steward of the royal households of King Henry I and King Stephen of England. He was castellan of Sherborne Castle until 1143....
as Commissioner Davies - Ray Galvin as Chief Boyle
- Art Hern as Mayor
- Ultra VioletUltra Violet (Isabelle Collin Dufresne)Isabelle Collin Dufresne is a French artist, author and former colleague and superstar of Andy Warhol.-Early life:...
as Sarah - Harry Rose as Landlord
Production
The misleading advertising campaign, which set up Simon as a SatanicSatanism
Satanism is a group of religions that is composed of a diverse number of ideological and philosophical beliefs and social phenomena. Their shared feature include symbolic association with, admiration for the character of, and even veneration of Satan or similar rebellious, promethean, and...
sex orgy film cashing in on Charles Manson
Charles Manson
Charles Milles Manson is an American criminal who led what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune that arose in California in the late 1960s. He was found guilty of conspiracy to commit the Tate/LaBianca murders carried out by members of the group at his instruction...
, seriously hurt the film at the box office. The film is practically bloodless, has some nudity (which, again against the norm, actually serves a purpose in the story) but no explicit sex and no parallels whatsoever with Manson. Like many other more eccentric 70's low budget genre films, Simon has become a cult film over the years, albeit an extremely marginal one.
There was also a paperback novelization of Simon by Baldwin Hills, more than likely a pen name, which took the satirical camp of the film one step further into full-on absurd comedy. Long since out of print, the book comes up occasionally on eBay
EBay
eBay Inc. is an American internet consumer-to-consumer corporation that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods and services worldwide...
and online used book stores.
Analysis
What sets Simon, King of the Witches apart from the legion of occultOccult
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus , referring to "knowledge of the hidden". In the medical sense it is used to refer to a structure or process that is hidden, e.g...
genre films of the late 60's and early 70's is the script, which is far more literate and versed in the esoteric than the norm, both offering new twists to and poking fun at the clichés of the genre. The character of Simon Sinestrari was reputedly based on the public persona of the ceremonial magician and occult author Poke Runyon, a well-known figure in the Southern California
Southern California
Southern California is a megaregion, or megapolitan area, in the southern area of the U.S. state of California. Large urban areas include Greater Los Angeles and Greater San Diego. The urban area stretches along the coast from Ventura through the Southland and Inland Empire to San Diego...
Neopagan
Neopaganism
Neopaganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements, particularly those influenced by or claiming to be derived from the various pagan beliefs of pre-modern Europe...
scene at that time. Runyon himself acknowledges the likeness, and has said that the only major inaccuracy is that he "never lived in a sewer".
Simon is also much more of a satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
than a horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
. Several scenes are obviously meant to be taken as black comedy, a fact that tends to escape traditional horror fans.
- The movie begins with Simon walking in the rain, reciting a monologue about being a powerful warlock, after which he is immediately busted for vagrancy.
- Simon lives in a storm drainStorm drainA storm drain, storm sewer , stormwater drain or drainage well system or simply a drain or drain system is designed to drain excess rain and ground water from paved streets, parking lots, sidewalks, and roofs. Storm drains vary in design from small residential dry wells to large municipal systems...
, where he performs rituals to the GoddessGoddessA goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....
AphroditeAphroditeAphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation.Her Roman equivalent is the goddess .Historically, her cult in Greece was imported from, or influenced by, the cult of Astarte in Phoenicia....
, and advises us on magical etiquette.
- A rainstorm floods the storm drain and washes away his magical paraphernalia.
- Simon's fortunes improve and, per the stereotype of many "powerful magicians", takes up residence in a basement (though, breaking another stereotype, it is not his parents' basement).
- Turk and Simon crash a "Wiccan" ceremony presided over by Ultra Violet. Every cliché in the book is dragged out, from spooky music, sinister chants, references to "Queen of the Night", to people undressing and eventually worshiping a real live goat. In a separate room, Turk is getting it on with a nude woman on an altar who refers to herself as a "sacred object" (a reference to the Church of SatanChurch of SatanThe Church of Satan is an organization dedicated to the acceptance of the carnal self, as articulated in The Satanic Bible, written in 1969 by Anton Szandor LaVey.- History :...
tradition of woman-as-altar). Simon is thoroughly unimpressed with the goings on and eventually ridicules the coven much in the way Frank LangellaFrank Langella-Early life:Langella, an Italian American, was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, the son of Angelina and Frank A. Langella Sr., a business executive who was the president of the Bayonne Barrel and Drum Company. Langella attended Washington Elementary School and Bayonne High School in Bayonne...
mocks Lena OlinLena OlinLena Maria Jonna Olin is a Swedish actress.-Early life:Olin was born the youngest of three children, in Stockholm, Sweden. She is the daughter of actress Britta Holmberg and the director Stig Olin...
's devil worshipers in the Roman PolanskiRoman PolanskiRoman Polanski is a French-Polish film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in Poland, Britain, France and the USA, he is considered one of the few "truly international filmmakers."...
film The Ninth GateThe Ninth GateThe Ninth Gate is a 1999 horror film directed, produced, and co-written by Roman Polanski. It is a neo-noir, occult mystery thriller involving the rare book business, wherein rare-book dealer Dean Corso is hired by bibliophile Boris Balkan to validate a seventeenth-century copy of The Nine Gates...
. The amused couple make a hasty exit with the angered Wiccans on their tail.
- Simon commands a pulsing ball of light that attempts to harm him, pointing his athameAthameAn Athame or Athamé is a ceremonial dagger, with a double-edged blade and usually a black handle. It is the main ritual implement or magical tool among several used in the religion of Wicca, and is also used in various other neopagan witchcraft traditions. It is variously pronounced or...
(ritual knife) at it and declaring, "I am Simon! I am God!"
- Simon shares with us his elaborate plans to enter the realm of the gods via sex magic, a special mirror, and the importance of proper timing.
- Simon attempts to hex "the establishment", to the delight of drug dealers and petty criminals.
- Simon yells at the gods, "Yea, though you may cast me down, I will rise and rise again until I stand among you!"
Through all of this, Simon's approach to his magic and the world is nothing short of cynical, and simultaneously practical yet grandiose. He holds absolutely no romanticism at all towards his work and reacts to everything else with laconic amusement.