Wishmaster 1997

In 1127, a powerful djinn is chained to a Persian emperor by a single jeweled amulet. The djinn grants the emperor two wishes, then tempts him with a brutal third: to set things right. A sorcerer named Zoroaster warns that the third wish would unleash legions of djinn onto Earth. To seal the danger, he reveals a fire opal that traps the djinn inside. The tale shifts to present-day America, where a new danger awakens from the same stone.

Raymond Beaumont, Robert Englund, oversees workers as they lower a mysterious statue of Ahura Mazda onto a ship. The crane operator, Mickey Torelli, Joseph Pilato becomes intoxicated and drops the box, killing Beaumont’s assistant Ed Finney and shattering the statue. A dockworker swipes the fire opal from the wreckage and sells it, setting the stage for a modern nightmare. The jewel lands at Regal Auctioneers, where Nick Merritt, Chris Lemmon, asks Alexandra Amberson, Tammy Lauren, to examine the artifact. The moment she glimpses something inside the gem, danger is unleashed: the Djinn awakens and roams in search of souls to power his reentry into the world.

Alex discreetly entrusts the gem to her close colleague Josh Aickman, Tony Crane, to study it further. As Josh gathers data, the gem explodes, destroying the lab and killing him. Lieutenant Nathanson, Ricco Ross, informs Alex of Josh’s death, while Beaumont sends her to consult Wendy Derleth, a folklore professor Jenny O’Hara. Wendy explains the djinn’s bargain: a wish-granting spirit who trades power for souls, twisting desires into curses for its own amusement. The Djinn’s plan becomes clearer when he adopts the guise of a dead man, Nathaniel Demerest, and begins stalking Alex.

The Djinn shows up at Nathanson’s precinct, granting the detective’s wish to prove a suspect’s guilt by sparking a chaotic shooting spree. In the ensuing mayhem, the Djinn locates Alex’s address and steals a clue about her. He next pressures Nick Merritt into a deal: one million dollars in exchange for his help. Nick’s desire comes true when his mother is killed in a plane crash that funds his plan, deepening the trap.

Every wish the Djinn grants brings Alex troubling visions, and she suspects something far more sinister than simple magic. She returns to Derleth, only to discover that the Djinn has used her mentor’s body to manipulate her. The being offers Alex three wishes of his own and even grants a free wish to show what might happen. She uses the first official wish to demand knowledge of the Djinn’s true nature, and the entity theatrically transports her into a hellish world inside the gem, where it revels in its evil. She escapes back to her apartment, alone, shaken but resolute.

When the Djinn targets Shannon Amberson, Alex hurries to a party hosted by Beaumont to confront him. The Djinn, once again in disguise as Nathaniel Demerest, manipulates the door guard, Johnny Valentine, into wishing to escape his routine life. The Djinn then ingratiates himself with Beaumont, turning the party’s artwork alive to wreak havoc on guests and security. A desperate chase ensues, culminating in a near-trap for Alex as the Djinn tries to frighten her into using her second and third wishes by endangering Shannon in a burning painting.

Alex steadies herself and makes a crucial move: she wishes the drunk crane operator Mickey Torelli had not been drinking on the job two days earlier. The Djinn is forced to grant the wish, which undoes the catastrophe that followed the statue’s destruction. The timeline shifts back, the party chaos dissolves, and Josh is alive again. Beaumont’s private collection houses the same prop—the fire opal—where the Djinn waits in dark luxury, biding his time to be released once more.

In the end, the ancient danger remains imprisoned inside the fire opal, waiting for the chance to be freed. The present-day battle between cunning, will, and fate leaves a chilling question: could a single wish unravel every safeguard, or is the trap truly inescapable? The story closes with the realization that the Djinn’s power is real, the opal is a doorway, and the world remains precariously close to the nightmare that began in a distant empire centuries ago, now housed within a gleaming sculpture and a hidden jewel.