The Prophecy

Gregory Widen – 1995 – USA

An oddity of the early 90s by only-time director (but busy screenwriter) Gregory Widen.  Hardly a masterpiece, but it exudes a strange and unique vibe.  It’s an apocalyptic, supernatural thriller with a wry sense of humor and an intriguing twist.  The Biblical archangel Gabriel appears on Earth to work on ushering in some sort of non-Hell anti-Heaven and looking particularly creepy as played by Christopher Walken, captured at the height of his career segue from eccentric leading man to self-parodying supporting weirdo.  Non-auteur genre movies like this that are so moderate in scope are rarely so thoughtfully cast.  Normally (or at least in 1995, let’s say) you might expect to find people like Christopher Lambert, Lou Diamond Phillips or Stephen Baldwin in a movie of this class.  Instead, the brooding, sadly underutilized Elias Koteas plays the aptly-named lead role of Thomas, a cop who was once a priest who lost his faith.  Despite the absence of any one scene in which he gets to gush about his spiritual ambivalence, Koteas manages to convey so much pain and pathos.  This – like many of his appearances in films – is a master class on acting technique; very few are as adept at telling a story with their faces; compensating for the details and exposition that never appeared on paper.  Filling out the idiosyncratic cast are Virginia Madsen, Amanda Plummer, Adam Goldberg and Eric Stoltz.  Stealing a scene from either Walken or Koteas is difficult, if not impossible, but it is nearly done by Viggo Mortensen as the devil incarnate in the film’s climax.  Spawned four sequels of speedily diminishing interest and quality; (Walken only held out for three of them; and Koteas didn’t return at all).