A while back I stumbled across the almost-forgotten 1971 “horror” film Simon, King of the Witches. The film is much better than the title suggests, with a compelling performance by the lead actor playing Simon … and a surprisingly thoughtful depiction of 20th century “ceremonial magick” practice.
Doing a little internet digging, trying to make sense of how the heck the film got made, I stumbled across an astonishing Amazon review full of lore about the world from which it emerged. I must capture it here:
An Insider’s Look at the insider’s look: Hollywood Occult Scene, 1970
Reviewed in the United States on July 15, 2008This film has several levels of meaning. Superficially it appears to be a stylish excursion through the Southern California psychedelic pop-culture era of self-styled warlocks and witches circa 1970. This was a time when magick was in the air and even the mundane world had a mysterious shimmer and sparkle. There will never be a time quite like it again — And for those of us caught in the spell of that bygone era, Southern California was the Land of Oz.
You can recapture the flavor and mystery of that now-ancient time and faraway place with the excellent DVD reissue of the 1971 film Simon, King of The Witches. How do I know this? Because according to urban myth, I was the real-life (if any of our lives at that time could be called “real”) model for the character of Simon Sinistari, the Hollywood warlock in the film.
Now that requires some qualification: I never lived in a storm drain, I never performed an 11th degree operation (gay sex magick), and I never killed anybody, but other than that, how many black bearded, cigar smoking, wine drinking, witch-bashing, self-proclaimed mighty wizards were there prowling the streets of Hollywood during the 1969-70 years? I ask this question because, in the excellent commentaries included in this reissue, both the actor Andrew Prine and the director Bruce Kessler state that screen writer Robert Phippeny was himself “a warlock” and the model for his own character. If this is true I will be more than happy to concede Simon’s tarnished crown to Phippeny — but I would like to know where he was while we were “doing his thing.”
The general consensus among the “old guard” (some of us did survive!) is that Robert Phippeny was at least a first-hand observer and a student of “The Black Arts.” He kept a low profile, whereas I did not. He may have used another name on the street. Many of us did. He had obviously read Aleister Crowley and Franz Bardon (putting him light years ahead of most witches in the magick department). The “magick” depicted in Simon comes closer to actual practice than anything previously shown on the screen — or subsequently for that matter. But just to be picky we should point out that there is no such thing as an “effluvial condenser” although effluvium is an appropriate ingredient for certain “fluid” condensers which could be charged sexually but would then have to be applied to the magick mirror, not hung over it as in the film. However this error may have been intentional in order to achieve a more dramatic effect. Phippeny’s knowledge of Bardon on sex magick is apparent in the colors of Simon's and Linda’s ceremonial robes: Simon wears blue and Linda wears red, reversing the polarities to create a dynamic interchange (see Initiation into Hermetics page 247 or 308 in the 2nd edition).
But we still want to know just what astrological aspect Simon was trying to exploit in his major magical working set for 1:33 p.m.?
Robert Phippeny certainly did his homework, but don’t try to use Simon as a training film anymore than you would use Saving Private Ryan as a guide to actually saving Private Ryan.
Beyond all the technical expertise demonstrated in the film we have what I consider a very good story — perhaps too good, and certainly too deep for the market the distributors appealed to. Director Bruce Kessler laments this in his commentary. The screen play is witty, sharp and well-crafted, although it gets a bit confusing in the end, obviously due to budget and time constraints. With all the limitations and the brief production time, Kessler and as his crew were really trying to make a meaningful film. Along that line I should point out that the novelized version of Simon, King of the Witches (Dell 1971) is an excuse for hack pornography by “Baldwin Hills” (name taken from a Southern California community) and serves only to remind the aspiring screen writer never to permit any novelized version of his work over which he has no control.
So, if Robert Phippeny is still out there somewhere, here’s a five-star review from “the old guard.” Let’s hear from you. Same goes for Andrew Prine and Bruce Kessler. You gave us a terrific memorial to our personal, funky, trippy, long-gone Land of Oz.
But perhaps the biggest unsolved mystery in Simon, King of the Witches are the identities of its stars? I always thought Andrew Prine and Brenda Scott had top billing. Who are Allyson Ames and Norman Burton?
Who has the swagger to claim to be the “real” Simon? He signed it:
Poke Runyon
Writer-Producer: Beyond Lemuria
Whoa.
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