When I was invited to participate in the scary/horror movie write-off I was very excited. You see I love movies, but I really have a special place in my heart for horror movies. So I began to think of the movies I could write about a lot of movies came to mind quickly and I discarded them all. Then I remembered The Prophecy.

The Prophecy is a 1995 film starring Christopher Walken as the archangel Gabriel here on Earth. He is basically pretty peeved off that "talking monkeys" (humans) can go to heaven, because they have souls, while angels (with no soul) cannot. His goal is to get the soul of the most evil human on Earth, the capture of which will help him battle the good angels so that he can get back into heaven. What I really like about this movie, aside from Christopher Walken, is that while it isn't a typical slice 'em and dice 'em horror movie it has some intense scenes. It also has some dark humor in it and I love that in a horror movie.

We begin the movie with Simon (Erick Stoltz) explaining how he was sent to Earth to steal the evil soul before Gabriel can get a hold of it. This is a very short scene, with a few cool effects in it, that gives you a little bit of an explanation of what is going on.

Next we move on to a church where a bunch of men are becoming ordained as priests. Here we meet Thomas (Elias Koteas), he is getting ready to say his words and become ordained when he has some horrible visions. He sees tortured angels and pain, all in flashes. The visions sequence is very quick moving so you get a sense of what is happening but it is all jumbled and kind of confusing. It works very well to explain why Tom is seen screaming and crying in terror.

We then skip ahead a few years to once again meet Tom. He has not become a priest after his ordeal and is now a detective in a large city (never named that I can recall). He goes into his apartment and finds Simon perched on the back of a chair in his room. (All the angels are shown in this position instead of seated and it looks really cool and almost creepy.) For reasons that I cannot fathom Tom is not terribly alarmed by Simon and they begin to chat. Simon mentions that he was there when Tom was to be ordained and they go on to discus some religious ideas.

Simon: Do you believe that you are a part of God's plan?
Tom: That's a complicated question.
Simon: No it isn't.

We then flash to a bad guy, and we know this because he is really ugly, walking around sniffing the air (angels can smell each other and know who they are). He is searching for Simon. He finds him and there is a small fight between the two during which we see that the bad guy has empty holes in place of eyes (the effect here is quite good) and then Simon promptly dispatches the man and takes off.

When the cops find the body they call on Tom because the guy has some obscure religious texts on him and they find all the materials that Simon left behind as well.

Now another skip, this time to a schoolhouse in a small, almost empty, mining town. We see that Simon has found the recently deceased Arthur (the most evil man on Earth) and he goes to the church and takes the mans soul into his body. Then he goes to the schoolhouse and hides out in unused rooms. Here we also get our first glimpse of Mary (Moriah Shining Dove Snyder) a young Indian girl at the school and her teacher Catherine (Virginia Madsen in a less that great performance).

Now back to the city where the medical examiner is telling Tom about all the strange findings on our mystery man. Not only did he not have his eyes, but he NEVER had eyes and has no optical nerves. If that isn't enough the man is a hermaphrodite and has no calcification of his bones, basically he has the body of a fetus. They DO NOT show any really gory stuff here, which I really like. You can imagine it however you want to, if you want to. They also have discovered that the man is in possession of a handwritten bible with an extra verse and a strange marking. The marking is also tattooed on the mans neck.
Tom is stunned and takes the book home to interpret. He discovers that the marking is angelic script and that it is the name of a lieutenant of Gabriel called Uriel. The extra verse in the book tells of the second war in heaven and how it has not yet ended.

Now we finally meet Gabriel (Christopher Walken). In search of Uriel he finds the murder scene and senses that Simon was there. He quickly goes to his "talking monkey" Jerry (Jerry is a man who committed suicide and Gabriel is keeping him, just alive to get him to drive him around and help him out) and gets Jerry (Adam Goldberg) to retrieve the personal effects of Uriel and the crime scene evidence. In the meantime Gabriel goes to the morgue to take care of the body, to get rid of the evidence or leave a message or something (that part is a bit unclear). The scenes with Gabriel and Jerry are pretty funny and some of my favorite in the movie.


Now that we know all the players it is time to see how they all come together.

In the next scene we find Mary playing in the closed off part of the school where she finds Simon, ill and hiding out with the evil soul in his body. He quickly gets Mary to trust him (special powers? I don't know) and she agrees to keep him a secret and to bring him food when she can. Later as Mary is sharing a coke with Simon her teacher, Catherine, finds them. She threatens to call the police on Simon and he tries to coax her out of it. He cannot (his powers not working? were there powers to begin with?) and she leaves and sends Mary out as well. Mary of course being "a clever girl" sneaks back in to be with Simon. Knowing his time is running short Simon offers to tell Mary a special secret, he then grabs her and jams their lips together so he can put the soul into her. Mary immediately becomes ill and has to be rushed home. (How the teacher can just leave in mid-day to take a kid home I will never know)

Now back in the city Gabriel and Jerry are discovering that the most evil man (Arthur) has just died and is in a small town they head off to get the soul, not knowing Simon beat them to it. Tom also learns this information and he heads off to investigate. On the way Gabriel stops at the cemetery and he perches on a tombstone while he watches poor Jerry dig up Arthur. As soon as Gabriel gets into the coffin he realizes that the soul is gone.

Gabriel: Jerry, come here. If you were a soul, where would you hide?
Jerry: The hell away from you. Soon Gabriel can sniff out the fact that Simon beat him to the soul and he is off to find him. Once he does find Simon we learn that the two were friends before the war. Gabriel tries to bring Simon around to his side but it is no good, Simon "is just doing what he is told". Gabriel is so mad that he proceeds to torture Simon to death. There are some graphic scenes here as Simon is burnt to death, slowly. The effects are also just a little sloppy in parts of this scene.

Now Tom is in town and he meets up with Catherine to ask about the burned man and Arthur. Catherine is no help at this point so he goes off on his own. Now we find out why Arthur's soul is so evil, through a series of film reels he has hidden away. Tom finds the reels and watches them and goes through some papers. The whole scene is very dark, it also has no talking so the emotion of the scene is all done with music. After seeing what Arthur had done Tom goes to the church. At the church his visions return and he gets a visit from Gabriel. Gabriel says some mysterious things and takes off, but Tom doesn't know who he is.

Next we find good old Gabriel at the school hanging out with the kids. He is trying to find out who spoke to Simon so he can track down the soul. Catherine catches him and Jerry hanging around there and makes them leave. Catherine is so upset by this that she hurries to check on Mary. She still has no idea what is going on she is just scared. (Again why she would leave all the other kids when two creepy guys are hanging around is a little odd) At Mary's she finds Tom there and they soon find out that the soul is possessing Mary, as she begins to spout off about killing men. Tom at this point decides to tell Catherine his theory.

Tom: Did you ever notice how in the Bible, when ever God needed to punish someone, or make an example, or whenever God needed a killing, he sent an angel? Did you ever wonder what a creature like that must be like? A whole existence spent praising your God, but always with one wing dipped in blood. Would you ever really want to see an angel?

Apparently Catherine has no problem believing this and she proceeds to tell Tom where he can find Gabriel. They run off to the abandoned mine shaft and find more angelic writing on the walls. Now in this scene there are some good special effects as they are both shown horrible visions of impaled and dying angels all around them.

Now the challenge as Tom and Catherine rush back to Mary, after not finding Gabriel, they see that he, and Jerry, are already there with Mary. They all begin fighting and Jerry sees his chance to finally die, so while Gabriel is busy with Mary and Catherine Jerry attacks Tom and lets Tom shoot him. Now Gabriel is even more mad since it is "so hard to find one of those". Catherine and Mary make a run for it and Tom and Gabriel fight. Eventually Catherine is outside with Mary, Tom is on his way out and Gabriel is staggering out. Catherine shoots a propane tank nearby and blows up Mary's trailer and knocks Gabriel out. Now even though they know Gabriel isn't dead and that they have to get Mary to an Indian exorcism (not as silly as it sounds) to get rid of the bad soul, Tom and Catherine sit around until the police come. They convince the police that Gabriel isn't dead and they should cuff him. The police so that and toss him in the car, and drive away. Now Tom, Mary and Catherine head out to the mountains to get to the ceremony. On the way they find scattered bits of the police car so they know Gabriel is free.

Now since Gabriel cannot drive he heads off to a hospital looking for a new "talking monkey" on the verge of death so he can get a new driver. Here he finds Rachel just as she dies. He keeps her from dying and somehow when she opens her eyes she knows that he is keeping her alive and in pain, so she goes along with him hoping he will let her die.

Now the others are at the ceremony and it is underway. Catherine goes outside of the building and there she meets Lucifer (Viggo Mortensen) and his lackey (this character is sort of pointless). He proceeds to tell Catherine that while he has no love for Mary or any human he also doesn't want Gabriel to win. Lucifer: God? God is love. I don't love you.

He is afraid of what will happen if Gabriel can get into heaven.
Lucifer: Heaven will become just another Hell, and that's just one too many. He also goes on to explain that because of the war heaven is "closed" and that all the souls of people who have died are just in limbo, unless they can be persuaded to go to hell. Lucifer:I'm always open, even on Christmas.

We see a little of Gabriel and Rachel on the way to find Mary but the scene here is pretty short.

Now we find Tom getting his visit from Lucifer. He tells Tom how he knows Tom lost his faith and how to defeat Gabriel. So now everyone gets ready for Gabriel to show up, while the ceremony goes on.

Once Gabriel gets there is a little fighting and a lot of talking. I wont spoil the ending but I will say that at the end there are some cool effects. And there are two sequels to this movie ;-)

Overall I really like this movie. The acting, of the main players, is really good (except Madesen who seemed really flat to me). The effects are pretty decent. The story and flow of the movie did have some problems but it is easy enough to overlook.

***This is part of a horror/scary movie write-off hosted by Jenni1396 to commemorate her 1 yr. anniversary here at Epinions. Other participants include: arpoet, beawriter, bpotter1, charlenep, ChrisJarmick, cntaur5, Darkmistress, Debbie26, jenni1396, mellkinwa, PacBayStat, phineaskc, smh32775
Please take some time and check out all of their hard work!***

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age