Captain Creepy's Crazy Cult Cinema - "Witchboard"

I love horror movies from the 80's. Many of them are so good and many more of  them are so bad. Some of the best ones though are so good and so bad at the same time. Witchboard from 1986 actually holds up well for a movie from this era. The music lets you know all too well what decade this is from with its generic hard rock soundtrack and electronic drum sounds. The music sounds exactly like any one of hundreds of other movies from the time. I can picture Sly Stallone as Rocky driving around in his fancy sportscar trying to figure out if he should climb in the ring with Ivan Drago while this music pulsates in the background. Getting past the music though, let's move on to the film itself.
Witchboard starts out at a party hosted by 80's/90's dream girl Tawny Kitaen and her boyfriend (no it's not David Coverdale). Linda (Tawny) invited her former boyfriend Brandon to the party, much to the chagrin of her current live in boyfriend Jim. There is heavy animosity between Brandon and Jim. Brandon busts out his Ouija Board and he and Linda use the board to call upon the spirit of a ten year old boy named David. Brandon has been communicating with David through the board for quite some time, he discloses. Of course Jim isn't buying it and things take a turn for the worse. The party ends badly as Jim and Brandon nearly come to blows during which Brandon leaves, forgetting to grab his Ouija. He calls Linda the next day and asks her to return his Witchboard to him later that week. Linda begins experimenting with the board by herself, which is a big no-no, asking David many questions and quickly becoming obsessed with the board and with the spirit of David. Bad things start to happen to Jim, seemingly due to the fact that David doesn't like Jim. Linda starts to act completely out of character as she begins to swear and become very moody and not like her normal self.
Later we discover that Jim and Brandon grew up together as best friends and had a falling out. The movie fleshes out some back story for the characters and does a good job of engaging the viewer and drawing you into the story. Jim and Brandon decide they have to put aside their differences in order to help Linda and defeat the evil spirit that may or may not be the young boy David, or may be someone else altogether.
The boys call in a psychic medium to try and help out the situation. The psychic, Zarabeth, is played by the girl that later played Luke's sister in Gilmore Girls. Zarabeth again hits us up side the head with 80's cliché as her appearance is a mix of Madonna, Boy George, and every punkish pre gothic stereotype that was conceivable in 1986. She is a good actress and a fun character at least.
There are some slow spots in Witchboard but overall I really like this movie. I hadn't watched this in years and must say that the acting is well done and the story is good. There is the typical cheese but much of the movie is played straight. It is a lot of fun but not overly ridiculous, a trap that many films from this time fall into.  Anyone that enjoys horror from this time period and isn't put off by the music and hairstyles may well find themselves happy to add this movie to their collection.
Captain Creepy loves Witchboard! Check it out.