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Excellent and often funny film that gets tagged as a horror movie too often.

One of the most misunderstood films of the 1970s, Simon, King of the Witches has long been advertised and promoted as a serious horror film about warlocks and witchcraft, but in reality, it was a quasi-comedy that focused as much on the counter-culture as it did black magic.

Andrew Prine stars as Simon, a homeless man living in the drains of San Francisco who purports to be a “true magician.” He falls in with local potheads and the like, most of whom never truly understand his form of “witchcraft,” instead thinking he’s the kind that sacrifices virgins and the like. Time after time in the film, Simon has to explain to them that he isn’t that kind of witch. Only after he has a run-in with the local law officials, in which a friend of his turns out to be the druggie daughter of the DA, does he try to use his powers for revenge.

While promoted exactly the opposite, Simon mocked the trappings of the genre, and is well-done for a film of its time and nature. Prine is excellent in the role of a been-there, done-that, slightly crazy (he talks to trees) vagrant who does what he can to get by.

Dark Sky’s DVD of the film features a very nice widescreen print. Prine is on hand for a brief interview, and director Bruce Kessler is around for the same. Both lament the film’s misconstrued advertising as having killed its chances at the box-office. The only other extras are a radio spot and the original theatrical trailer.

Simon, King of the Witches deserves another chance with a new generation on DVD. It’s trippy psychedelia and counter-culture social commentary only add to the humor and make it an undiscovered treasure waiting to be found.

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