False Prophecy

On a bit of a lark, I decided to watch the movie The Prophecy not long ago. Not the 1979 Prophecy about a giant killer bear-monster-thing, but the 1995 film in which Christopher Walken plays a vengeful angel.

In fact, Walken is pretty much the reason I wanted to see the film. I find him pretty much awesome in everything. And yet, you can plainly see that the man has no taste. Or maybe it's no shame. Point being, he likes to work, and he doesn't seem too particular about what he's working in. He's made some great movies in his long career, and he's signed on for utter crap.

Sadly, I found Prophecy to be more in the latter camp. The plot of the movie is supposed to be about a "war" involving the angels, some of whom are rebelling out of jealousy for the freedom bestowed on man by God. But this is the talkiest war with the smallest number of confrontations that has ever been put on film. Really, you just watch a couple drive around from place to place with this young kid who's "important," occasionally pursued by Walken's angel, Gabriel.

I'll give Walken credit -- he chews some scenery and makes it enjoyable. That's exactly what I wanted from this movie. And he's not the only one, either. Viggo Mortensen also shows up as Lucifer, and in a top notch performance, he delivers the killer line of the movie: "Your war is arrogance. That makes it evil. That's mine."

But the rest of the movie is a worthless mess. Hokey and boring even at the time it was made, I think it's been rendered even more obsolete by the awesome couple of seasons the TV series Supernatural has been having (dealing in a much more powerful and cooler way with not-nice angels). Even the Walken factor just isn't enough to make The Prophecy worth seeing. I give it a D-.