The Reaping

APRIL 8, 2007

GENRE: RELIGIOUS
SOURCE: THEATER (REGULAR SCREENING)

Happy Easter everyone. I hope you all celebrated as I did, by watching The Reaping, a horror movie with a priest being immolated and lots of "God doesn't exist" talk. I know, its not quite as spiritual as hiding a colored egg, but I made an effort dammit!

The first hour or so is actually pretty good (for a Dark Castle movie), playing out like a big screen X-Files movie (not THE X-Files movie, which played out like deleted scenes from a bad episode of X-Files for the most part), with Swank as Scully and Idris Elba as Mulder (if Mulder was a street punk sporting a bunch of bullet wound scars). Eventually though, Swank has no choice but to BELIEVE! and then the movie begins to unravel, And then, like almost all Dark Castle movies, the end spirals completely out of control and it becomes a bunch of nonsense, and then quite Omenously sets up a sequel.

If anyone can understand what purpose Steven Rea serves in the film, they are a better man than I, and an even better woman. He sees some fiery photos, he makes a phone call or two with warnings that are basically ignored, and then he burns to death. Thanks for stopping by, Steve.

For a genre arm, Dark Castle is not as abysmal as Ghost House or Screen Gems, but close. Their remakes are OK, with 2005's Tourist Trap remake faring best. But their originals (to recap: Gothika, Ghost Ship, and this) pale in comparison, although this is by far the best of those three (and it's worth noting that this was written by the same guys who wrote the Tourist Trap remake). In fact, it falls just shy of being "good", but it just seems like the writers got lazy after an hour or so, or Joel Silver just got impatient, and it was decided to get this one over with ASAP. Which is kind of a shame, because, much like Emily Rose, it's at it's most interesting when giving the audience both a spiritual and scientific explanation for everything and letting you wonder for yourself if you believe it or not. Once we are given irrefutable proof that it is indeed a 'miracle', it loses its most interesting angle.

But for the grace of God, none other than William Ragsdale shows up in this film, and you gotta love that. Where the hell you been, Bill? Fright Night 3 ain't gonna happen anytime soon, get off your ass and show up in more movies!

Whenever an A list star (or a just plain lazy one) is asked about their favorite horror movies, the answers are almost always "The Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby" (The Shining and Silence of the Lambs get thrown in now and then too). Which must be why so many religious themed horror films get made and why they attract bigger and better than average stars for horror films. It's just a shame so many of them disappoint. Hopefully a DVD of this film will feature more story points, since I find it hard to believe that Swank would sign on to the film based on the script of the finished product. I mean, she was in The Core for christ's sake; the girl's got taste.

And for the 8247th time this year, the goddamn Invisible trailer played before the film. It's a shit trailer, because it gives away the entire film (which isn't too bad for a teen thriller, for the record) and also plays before every goddamn movie I see. Can't wait till that one's gone.

What say you?