So I was hanging around this dumb field in western Massachusetts when I found this creepy doll. I, of course, obliterated it for fun, and now I’m seeing this creepy lady around. That’s the last thing I remember, I’m losing time, I think I have brain damage. Do you remember what happened in The Unholy?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) We meet unscrupulous reporter Gerry Feen (Jeffery Dean Morgan) as he heads out to Western Mass (presumably) … for what reason?
2) Obviously that’s a bust, but he discovers something there. What does he discover, what does he think it is, and what terrible mistake does he make?
3) What did Gerry Fenn do in his past that made his persona non grata at the Boston Examiner, and now with his big scoop what position does he want from them?
4) Oh yeah, there is a religious story going on here. Miracles are a happenin’ and people think they are from the Virgin Mary. Name the three miracles witnessed by the townspeople.
5) How does Father Hagan figure out who Mary really is, and who is Mary really?
Bonus Question: At the end of the film Gerry Fenn is out of journalism for good, but what does he end up doing afterwards?
Jamie and Patrick stand ready for the influx of ninja as Kyle slowly opens the door, fearing for his own safety and wondering what could have happened to lovely Rachel and her lovely pretzels. The door swings open and Jamie and Patrick’s twin chop stops short. Rachel looks between them wide eyed. “What’s going on guys, who wants some piping hot pretzels?” Kyle quickly shuttles her to his room. “Don’t mind these jokesters, Rachel. They definitely didn’t think you were a pack of Dongle obsessed ninjas,” he says while staring daggers at them. Jamie shakes his head and puts his hands on his hips. “My word, what’s going on, Patrick? We almost twin chopped Rachel’s head off and all because you thought she was a pack of Dongle obsessed ninjas. The only pack I saw was the six pack of salty delicious soft pretzels she was carrying. And guess what? I’m not thinking we’re getting any pretzels tonight.” Jamie is clearly peeved. Patrick just shakes his head in wonder. “I don’t understand. We have this Dongle and yet what are we protecting it from? If I was our mortal enemy I would have exploited our pretzel obsession with ninjas. It’s almost like no one cares… you know?” He flops sadly into the couch. “What is this all for? Our lives used to be so exciting and yet now we just sit here, our Dongle in our hands.” Suddenly there is another knock at the door and they hear hardscrabble reporter Lindsey Appleton ask to come in. “My god!” Patrick says excitedly. “What, is she also a ninja?” Jamie asks, but Patrick shakes his head and through a series of intricate hand signals he explains that she is in fact the devil himself in disguise. That’s right! We are watching the major 2021 motion picture The Unholy. ‘What?’ you ask. Only the biggest theatrical release of last April. It’s about a reporter and the devil or something. Who cares? Let’s go!
The Unholy (2021) – BMeTric: 52.4; Notability: 15
StreetCreditReport.com –BMeTric: top 4.8%; Notability: top 13.2%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 14.1%; Higher BMeT: Space Jam: A New Legacy, Thunder Force, He’s All That, Cosmic Sin, Deadly Illusions, Music, Awake, Home Sweet Home Alone, The Kissing Booth 3, The Misfits, Spiral, Great White; Higher Notability: Space Jam: A New Legacy, Tom and Jerry, Music, Chaos Walking, Infinite, The Addams Family 2, Home Sweet Home Alone, Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, Red Notice, Snake Eyes, Sweet Girl, Cherry, Dear Evan Hansen, The Starling, Thunder Force, The Birthday Cake, Reminiscence, The Woman in the Window, Voyagers, Breaking News in Yuba County, and 13 more; Lower RT: After We Fell, Out of Death, Cosmic Sin, Separation, Music, Midnight in the Switchgrass, Breaking News in Yuba County, American Traitor: The Trial of Axis Sally, Deadly Illusions, Infinite, Die in a Gunfight, Home Sweet Home Alone, Zone 414, The Virtuoso, The Misfits, Sweet Girl, The Starling, Every Breath You Take, Senior Moment, Thunder Force, and 8 more; Notes: So hard to tell with this year-of releases. BMeTric is very high though. And low-5.0 on IMDb is formidable.
RogerEbert.com – 2.0 stars – Disgraced journalist Gerry Fenn (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), investigating an incident of “cattle mutilation” in a small Massachusetts town, trips over another bigger story, when a deaf teenage girl sees the Virgin Mary in the trunk of the scariest-looking tree on the planet. Quivering with religious ecstasy, she performs a couple of miracle cures, and when word gets out—thanks to Fenn’s stories—her small town turns into a modern-day Lourdes. But is the Virgin Mary who she says she is? Based on James Herbert’s 1983 novel Shrine, “The Unholy” is fairly standard religious horror, just in time for Good Friday. It has some excellent jump-scares, but overall there’s something rote about the execution, bits that feel sketched-in as opposed to filled out, and a surface-level interest in the main theme of Herbert’s novel: what happens when the unholy masks itself as holy? The local priest says, “Wherever God goes, the unholy follows.” You got that right. The devil doesn’t strut into town cackling with evil glee. The devil is a smooth-talking charmer. “The Unholy” is not designed to be deep, but since glimmers of depth are present, the lack of follow-up makes this a disappointing watch. “The Unholy” misses a lot of opportunities to build out not just this idea, but all of them.
(That is a very long paragraph to effectively say: a rote religious horror film we’ve now seen dozens of times. I’m more interested in reading the book now though.)
(Oh boy, the little teaser bit at the beginning looks awful. And the rest indeed seems very generic.)
Directors – Evan Spiliotopoulos – ( BMT: The Unholy; Notes: He’s written a ton of films (including this one). This is his first directorial effort, so he is obviously looking to expand things out.)
Writers – Evan Spiliotopoulos – ( Known For: Beauty and the Beast; Charlie’s Angels; Hercules; Battle for Terra; Pooh’s Heffalump Movie; The Blue Elephant; Art Heist; Future BMT: The Huntsman: Winter’s War; The Jungle Book 2; BMT: Snake Eyes; The Unholy; Notes: Wait … he wrote Snake Eyes and The Unholy this year?! Busy bee.)
James Herbert – ( Known For: Haunted; The Survivor; Deadly Eyes; Future BMT: Fluke; BMT: The Unholy; Notes: Evidently a staple of British horror writings, he has a bunch of novels from the 70s and 80s which are notable enough to get their own wikipedia page. I think I’m going to read The Rats, his first book and the first in a trilogy of horror books he wrote.)
Actors – Jeffrey Dean Morgan – ( Known For: Watchmen; Rampage; The Losers; Solace; The Salvation; The Postcard Killings; The Resident; They Came Together; Heist; The Accidental Husband; Texas Killing Fields; Taking Woodstock; Shanghai; Desierto; Walkaway Joe; Peace, Love & Misunderstanding; The Courier; Six: The Mark Unleashed; Live!; Dead & Breakfast; Future BMT: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice; Fred Claus; P.S. I Love You; The Possession; BMT: The Unholy; Jonah Hex; Red Dawn; Notes: Oh you mean Denny from Grey’s Anatomy. He’s a character actor of sorts, but now a television star with his turn as the bad-guy-turned-good-guy Negan on The Walking Dead.)
Cricket Brown – ( BMT: The Unholy; Notes: Acted almost entirely in short films prior to this, including Wake Up by Olivia Wilde.)
William Sadler – ( Known For: The Shawshank Redemption; Iron Man Three; The Green Mile; The Mist; Bill & Ted Face the Music; The Highwaymen; Die Hard 2; The Hot Spot; Rush; Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey; Kinsey; Freaked; The Duel; Project X; Freeheld; Trespass; Being Flynn; Hanky Panky; Greetings from Tim Buckley; Freedom; Future BMT: Eagle Eye; Machete Kills; Disturbing Behavior; The Grudge; August Rush; Man on a Ledge; Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight; Bordello of Blood; RocketMan; BMT: The Unholy; Hard to Kill; K-9; Solo; Notes: The Unholy, Hard to Kill, and K-9 were all this year. Truly the Year of Sadler. He played Sgt. Merwin J. Toomey in a Tony Award winning production of Biloxi Blues.)
Budget/Gross – $10 million / Domestic: $15,530,440 (Worldwide: $30,830,440)
(Looks okay maybe. Especially considering the pandemic. I imagine they would be looking for like $50 million)
Rotten Tomatoes – 26% (15/57): Rarely scary and often dull, The Unholy falls back on the same tired tropes that have already been done to death by countless other religious horror movies.
(Nooooooo, not dull. The rest seem more reasonable. I do imagine this is just a run of the mill religious horror film.)
Reviewer Highlight: The Unholy has the stately aura (and endless speechifying) of a sermon, but it’s really a creaky nothing of a B-movie, like a chintzy Halloween exhibit set up inside an old church. – A.A. Dowd, AV Club
(I like that it’s artistic and how everything is framed. Adequate font to boot. Biggest critique is that it seems a little unpolished. Almost like fan art or something. A little too much going on maybe. I don’t know. Still pretty good. B.)
Tagline(s) – Be careful who you pray to. (B+)
(I kinda like this. Simple changes lend a level of cleverness to it. It’s quick and concise and gives us an idea of what’s going on. A little clunky, though. Could it have just been ‘Be careful what you pray for’? Maybe they took it a step too far and now it sounds a little off.)
Top 10: Blade Runner 2049 (2017), The Princess Bride (1987), Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009), The Green Mile (1999), Children of Men (2006), Watchmen (2009), The Unholy (2021), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), The Passion of the Christ (2004), Awakenings (1990)
Future BMT: 55.0 Evan Almighty (2007), 44.5 The Reaping (2007), 41.2 Ben-Hur (2016), 41.1 Michael (1996), 30.8 Arthur and the Invisibles (2006), 25.2 Miracle at St. Anna (2008), 24.6 Angels in the Outfield (1994), 20.9 The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999), 20.2 Do You Believe? (2015), 9.3 The Nativity Story (2006)
BMT: The Unholy (2021), A Walk to Remember (2002), Winter’s Tale (2014), Going Overboard (1989), Solarbabies (1986)
Matches: Children of Men (2006), The Unholy (2021), The Prince of Egypt (1998), Winter’s Tale (2014), Miracles from Heaven (2016), Breakthrough (2019), Wristcutters: A Love Story (2006), The Christmas Candle (2013), The Cokeville Miracle (2015), Henry Poole Is Here (2008), Leap of Faith (1992), A Christmas Tree Miracle (2013), Miracle on Christmas (2020), The Reason (2020), 17 Miracles (2011), Touch (1997), Picking Up the Pieces (2000), Joshua (2002), Miracle at Sage Creek (2005), The Third Miracle (1999), A Karate Christmas Miracle (2019), The Visitation (2006), Julie Walking Home (2002), The Testaments: Of One Fold and One Shepherd (2000), A Lobster Tale (2006), Taliesin Jones (2000), Runaway Hearts (2015), The Final Patient (2005)
(What happened in 2005 to make religious films bounce up so much I wonder. Passion of the Christ proving that religious themed films have power? That seems like it. And man, I don’t look forward to watching Evan Almighty eventually.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 19) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Cary Elwes is No. 3 billed in The Unholy and No. 3 billed in Kiss the Girls, which also stars Ashley Judd (No. 2 billed) who is in The Identical (No. 2 billed) which also stars Ray Liotta (No. 3 billed) who is in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (No. 2 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (3 + 3) + (2 + 2) + (3 + 2) + (3 + 1) = 19. If we were to watch P.S. I Love You, and The Black Dahlia we can get the HoE Number down to 16.
Notes – Based on the classic gothic horror novel by master of the genre the late James Herbert.
The publicity/marketing campaign for “The Unholy” utilized preeminent Parapsychologist Christopher Chacon to promote its release. As one of the world’s foremost authorities on supernatural/occult and metaphysical phenomena, Chacon has investigated and researched thousands of cases around the world of miracles and divine-intervention phenomena, as well as thousands of possessions and supernatural infestations, having worked with the Roman Catholic Church as well as every religious/spiritual belief-system.
In Spain the movie was titled “Ruega por nosotros” (Pray for us), referencing the “Ave María” (“Hail Mary” in English), a Christian prayer about the Virgin Mary: -Spanish: “Dios te salve María, llena eres de gracia. El Señor es contigo. Bendita tú eres entre todas las mujeres, y bendito es el fruto de tu vientre, Jesús. Santa María, Madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros pecadores, ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte. Amén”. -English: “Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen”.
The movie mentions Lourdes, Fatima and Medjugore. (1) On February 11, 1858 in Lourdes, France, a 14 year old girl named Bernadette Soubirous told her mother that a lady had talked with her from a cave close to her home in Massabielle. Due to the different apparitions and miracles in Lourdes, on July 3, 1876, Pope Pius IX officially granted a Canonical Coronation to the Blessed Virgin Mary of Lourdes. (2) On May 13, 1917 in Fatima, a town belonging Ourém, Portugal, three children — the siblings Francisco, Jacinta and Lucía do Santos — claimed to have witnessed the appearance of the Virgin Mary, who talked them and gave the oldest sister, Lucía, three prophecies (known as the Three Secrets of Fatima). Diverse miracles happened where the three children had seen her, such as a dancing sun and miraculous healing, and a sanctuary was built in that place. In 2000, Pope John Paul II beatified Francisco and Jacinta in 2000, after their premature deaths in 1919 and 1920. (3) On June 24, 1981 in Medjugorje (now Bosnia and Herzegovina, then SFR Yugoslavia), six teenagers named Ivan Dragicevic, Ivanka Ivankovic, Jakov Colo, Marija Pavlovic, Mirjana Dragicevic and Vicka Ivankovic — the oldest of whom were 16 — claimed to have received messages from the Blessed Virgin Mary, causing strong controversy among the anti-Catholic regime in Eastern Europe at that time (the USSR was opposed to any demonstrations of religious faith). In time, all three places became places of pilgrimage, even for the later Popes of Rome, receiving several million visitors each year, with further healing and miracles continuing to this day.
The movie ends with a quotation: “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s. clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.” It is from Matthew 7:15.
When a mysterious red ruby crosses her desk, Alex immediately sends it off for analysis. Soon thereafter people around her start to die and she comes under the influence of a djinn. He needs her to request three wishes and he’ll be free to rule the world. Can Alex stop this mystical, all-powerful monster before it’s too late? Find out in… Wishmaster.
How?! Alex is an antiques appraiser, so naturally when a dockworker swipes a jewel from the site of a gruesome crate-crushing-a-person accident she’s the first to see it. She takes one look at it and is like “uh, something is up with this jewel.” She sends it to a friend for analysis, who releases a gruesome djinn in the process. The monster kills him and proceeds to run rampant through the city granting wishes and twisting them to his own horrific devices. All while this is happening Alex is getting flashes of what this Wishmaster is doing. Ultimately the djinn needs to gain power by stealing souls via his wishes in order to power up the jewel. Then he needs Alex to get three wishes granted and voila he’ll be free and ready to rule the world and mold it to his own gruesome vision. Realizing what’s going on, Alex eventually arrives at the doorstep of a folklore professor who explains exactly what’s going on with the djinn. The djinn tracks down the professor and takes her place when Alex comes a-knockin’ again. Horrified, but somewhat prepared, Alex attempts to trick the Djinn, but has her wish turned against her and she’s trapped in the jewel, forcing her to use a second wish to get out. Scared that the djinn is going after her sister, Alex rushes to a party, which quickly turns horrific at the hands of the djinn. The djinn tries to force Alex to use her third wish to save her sister, but Alex stays calm and instead wishes that the person responsible for the crate-crushing-a-person accident wasn’t wasted at the time. This reverses time and retraps the djinn in the jewel. THE END (or is it? (ugh, unfortunately not)).
Why?! Who runs the world? Djinns. Who runs the world? Djinns. That’s all that stupid djinn wants. He wants the world to be full of horrors because that’s what he likes: immense suffering of humans as a result of their puny wishes. But Alex won’t have any of that. She just wants safety for her family and that means that djinn must be stopped.
Who?! A number of cameos here with Tony Todd and Kane Hodder. Robert Englund also has a more substantial role. Might be more even, as this is a horror film for horror fans. I’d also like to take a moment to meditate on the monster: the djinn. Fun to have something all powerful and evil and yet limited in some way. Creates fun as a trickster. They quickly muck it all up in the second though by making a whole bunch of new rules. Necessary because it’s a bit of a one trick pony. Once you figure out the trick in the first film you have to change the game.
What?! Mark another in the Coca-Cola column. Also funny product placement with Pacific Bell (makes sense with the setting of the film), only made funnier by the fact that in the goofs section of the imdb they note that while most phones in the film sport the Pacific Bell logo, the phone at her apartment has a BellSouth logo. Uh oh! What a goof!
Where?! This is Los Angeles through and through. I’m glad too. I think LA should be the location for more horror, but for some reason the classics are more intrigued by terror destroying the perceived safety of Midwestern suburbia… or the empty horror of the backwater South… or the Northeast and its tradition of witches and ghosts. But LA is a weeeeiiiirrrd place and I think they use it nicely in this film. B.
When?! This is the one drawback of LA. You can’t tell from the weather what time of year it is so there isn’t much pushing a filmmaker to take that extra step and establish an exact date. There might be one in here somewhere, but I didn’t notice it on first viewing so it’s an F… for now.
I really liked the look of this film. Some really great (and gross) effects for the most part and then some nice acting by Divoff to bring the Djinn to life (ruined in the second film). The only big issue for me was that they jump into a bunch of rules for how the djinn operates expressly so they could figure out a way to deliver the final “twist” for how Alex manages to trick the djinn and get out of the predicament. This creates a bunch of problems when inevitably you have the djinn more or less doing what he wants with everyone else in order to squeeze in your sweet, sweet practical effects death scenes for all the minor characters. And you can tell that they knew what they were doing. This was a film made by people steeped in horror lore. How? Because they were already including cameos by Kane Hodder and Tony Todd. They knew what they were up to and it worked out OK for the first film, but really hamstrung them for any possibility of having a decent franchise. Speaking of, the second Wishmaster is horrific. One of the worst. Everything falls apart so quickly because of how things were set up in the first film that you wonder why they even bothered to make another film (let alone more after that). And Divoff in turns cranks the Djinn up to such a degree that it seems like he’s in a comedy. Ugh. The problem is that I actually like watching horror films, and in particular horror franchises, so when one veers so quickly into unwatchable territory it’s truly dismaying. Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! We got wishes! We got a who’s who of horror icons! We’ve got djinns! Let’s go!
P’s View on the Preview – The horror genre for this cycle caused a lot of consternation. Mostly it is because as far as wide releases are concerned I think we’ve kind of worked through some of the best we have. But there was at least one 90s franchise we hadn’t touched yet. Wishmaster, which amusingly comes right on the heels of watching Kazaam. What were my expectations? The trailer showed what was up with this film, a whole lotta practical effects. The reviews said the issue with this: they forgot to write an actual script. I’m just going to be here counting wishes.
The Good – At times the practical effects were indeed quite fun. The people creating the film obviously had a lot of affection for that approach to horror and so do I, so even when a bit cheesy I appreciated that they were willing to create a film where multiple practical effect centered scenes were presented. And the subject, a djinn, is perfect in that regard. A wish can be fantastic, and an evil djinn who twists that wish in sadistic ways can create fantastical horror as a result. A large part of the film at its core is well done and a very good idea to boot. Best bit: The practical effects.
The Bad – But the film falls down at the lore which is somehow both non-existent and so oppressive as to tie one’s hands. The Djinn can grant a wish for the price of your soul? But then the woman who conjured him up gets three wishes? But after her third wish the Djinns rule the world? It all is a very silly means to a not-very-exciting end. And yeah, the acting and script are pretty bad. Any part with non-practical effects looks bad. I do have to give credit, where you would expect the final wish to be dumb, it actually works. Question though … if the goal is merely to grant three wishes to your master and then you get to rule the world, why would the Djinn choose to make any wishes bad? Doesn’t that just tip your hand that you are a terrifying monster? Whatever. Fatal flaw: End-to-end lore, and it isn’t even that good of lore. Should have saved that for the sequel, never go full-lore on the first film.
The BMT – I love watching horror franchises. Maybe someday I might even finish this one (there are two other straight-to-video sequels, but ain’t no one got time for that). But this one is really interesting in that the first has a somewhat botched fun idea and the sequel … well more on that in the friend section. It certainly represents something of a last hurrah for large scale practical effects driven horror. Something like Hostel or Saw maybe does some of that, both that could certainly be said for something like supernatural horror which must all be CGI at this point. Just fun stuff. Did it meet my expectations? Yeah, it really gave me that sweet sweet practical effects while also being amusingly bad in its own way.
Roast-radamus – A pretty fun Product Placement (What?) for Pacific Bell with multiple telephones sporting the logo in full throughout the film. An okay Setting as a Character (Where?) for Los Angeles, or at least California as evidenced by the license plates on the cars. I’m not going to give it anything for the twist since it was actually pretty good. Closest to Good I think, it is a pretty fun (if messy) horror film I think.
Sequel, Prequel, Remake – I would love to do something funny here, but this film really deserves a Remake. The first one is okay with the wishes and stuff, but I still think there is room to improve the lore. The Djinn are all powerful, so why can’t he destroy himself if he wants? But … just make that bit undesirable to the main character. At the beginning of the film the main character’s husband is killed when the Djinn is created. The Djinn is attempting to fulfil a condition, thirteen souls captured by wishes that take another’s life and the Djinn can open a portal and control the world. But, the one who freed the Djinn can bind it to the fire opal with one of three wishes. With 12 souls captured (and 12 gruesome deaths) the hero finds the Djinn, and the hero wishes for the Djinn to destroy himself. Fine, but then your love is dead forever, you could have him back if you so wish, but I’ll destroy myself if you want. Hesitating, she instead wishes for her love to live again. The Djinn creates a tree with the man’s soul bound to it, forever trapped in agony. She wishes for her love to be a living human, and he is, but with terminal cancer, with mere weeks to live. With one wish left she uses the same twist from the first film, I wish for a specific moment that allowed the Djinn’s fire opal to be discovered to have changed in the past. And voila! The events of the film are undone, but the fire opal lies in wait for another chance to fulfil the prophecy. Not much much different, but I think it cleans up the lore a bit and also allows for people to wish for anything. It is just the Djinn’s (tricky) logic that often tempts them into trying to outsmart him, and that often fails.
Bring a Friend Analysis – I do love when we can do the same franchise as part of a friend, and this time we got to do Wishmaster 2: Evil Never Dies. Everything about this movie is awful. It opens with them spitting in the face of the lore (if someone wishes to have never been born, and you grant that wish uh … why does the main character have a picture of that person in her apartment? Riddle me that!), the Djinn constantly just says like “I can’t grant that wish”, the movie establishes totally different lore (the Djinn must collect 1001 souls prior to taking over the world … he definitely didn’t do that the last time), and in the end they don’t even bother to have the One Weird Trick loophole, instead it seems like most of the mischief the Djinn got up to actually ended up happening? Combine that with the fart joke and Divoff’s weird unchanging facial expressions (which at times seemed like a joke? As if they were poking fun at themselves and the absurdity of the character’s monotone when acting as a human? Bizarre), and the film is awful. Amazingly people online seem to like 1 and 2 about the same, and love Divoff in the role. Divoff is solid in the first, but here I think the direction let’s him down and they leaned a bit too hard into the quipiness which also caused issues during some of the Leprechaun installments. Actually, two very similar series. I could definitely imagine a timeline in which there are seven or eight Wishmasters if it had started in 1989. C+. I think it is worth the watch if you watched the first one, but it is quite bad if you aren’t into the wink-wink comedy horror sequel idea.
Oh man, so hear this, I found this jewel and released a djinn. But then I accidentally wished that I got bopped on the head, and voila I sustained a massive concussion and now can’t remember a thing. Do you remember what happened in Wishmaster?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) The beginning of the film shows the origin of the fire opal. Where did it come from and why was it made?
2) After the death of her friend, Alex is moping about, and her sister is concerned. But Alex insists it is nothing like last time. What happened in Alex’s childhood that still haunts her?
3) We learn a little bit more about the collector who brought the statue which contained the Djinn’s gemstone to California. Why did he want the statue?
4) What final trick does Alex pull to defeat the Djinn using her third wish?
5) Name as many of the other wishes the Djinn grants throughout the film (by my count there are 14 besides the final wish) and what do they get instead?
Bonus Question: How long do Josh and Alex stay together after the film ends?
Clutch Guthrie checks his chute and looks down on the target area. “You sure you’re OK with a night jump?” The pilot screams over the sound of the engine. Clutch squints and smiles smugly, “I invented the night jump. Besides, how else do you think we can get into Fort Knox to steal the gold for the Vice President’s ransom?” The pilot nods, but then grabs him by the arm. “Hold on, Clutch,” He listens closely to his headset and pales, “It’s not just the Vice President, Clutch. Your ex-wife was part of a group taking a tour of the VP’s residence.” Clutch punches the wall and pulls down his goggles. “McGuire just made this personal,” and with that he jumps. He floats majestically like a bird, soaring towards the only area of Fort Knox that isn’t protected by laser beams: the rooftop exhaust port. One square foot in area and the President knew that there was only one man for the job: Clutch Guthrie. What Clutch didn’t tell him was that he knew the man who had taken the VP hostage. They knew him as McGuire. He knew him as McGuire Guthrie. His twin brother.
Patrick leans back from his typewriter and looks at what is shaping up to be a pretty damn thrilling novel. When he looks over at the piece of shit hack Manfred Long he finds the man sweating profusely in front of a blank page. “You OK Manfred?” he asks and Manfred’s head snaps up. “Shut up, I’m working!” He cries shrilly and takes to stroking the Obsidian Dongle. Suddenly his face lights up. “I wish…” he starts softly but then emboldened he yells, “I want to write the raddest story of them all! Make it so wishmaster!” He points the Dongle at his chest. That’s right we are taking on a bit of a cult classic of horror in Wishmaster. Poorly reviewed, but made by a special effects artist turned occasional director, you better believe we’ll get a visual feast. It’s just all the other stuff that is more questionable. Let’s go!
Jamie and the gang duck and bob and weave at the airborne cyborgs. “This isn’t so crackerjack after all,” Kyle says and Jamie shakes his head. At least Patrick seems to be faring better. When he sees Manfred use the Dongle he sighs. “If only we had a wishmaster, too.” He perks up. Wishmaster… too. That gives him an idea. That’s right! We are pairing that with Wishmaster 2: Evil Never Dies. You have to appreciate the horror franchises that jump straight to video. Let’s go!
Wishmaster (1997) – BMeTric: 34.7; Notability: 38
StreetCreditReport.com –BMeTric: top 14.0%; Notability: top 16.4%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 22.2%; Higher BMeT: Batman & Robin, Speed 2: Cruise Control, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, Home Alone 3, Anaconda, Steel, Mr. Magoo, Double Team, Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie, Spawn, Flubber, An American Werewolf in Paris, Jungle 2 Jungle, Fire Down Below, Gone Fishin’, Turbulence, McHale’s Navy, Plump Fiction, Kull the Conqueror, An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn, and 15 more; Higher Notability: Batman & Robin, The Saint, Speed 2: Cruise Control, Dante’s Peak, Flubber, The Jackal, The Postman, Spawn, The Man Who Knew Too Little, Fathers’ Day, Red Corner, Meet Wally Sparks, Kiss the Girls, An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn, Event Horizon, The Devil’s Own, Fire Down Below, Steel, Vegas Vacation, Warriors of Virtue, and 21 more; Lower RT: Plump Fiction, Shadow Conspiracy, The Blackout, Fall, The Peacekeeper, McHale’s Navy, Gone Fishin’, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, Speed 2: Cruise Control, ‘Til There Was You, Mr. Magoo, An American Werewolf in Paris, An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn, The Pest, Dangerous Ground, The Postman, Keys to Tulsa, Double Team, 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag, How to Be a Player, and 32 more; Notes: 90s Horror is always interesting. This seems like a cult film, usually bad horror films are absolutely dunked on by horror fans online, but high 5s on IMDb is actually not at all bad for a horror film. We’ve only watched six of the top ten BMeT films from 1997 which is unimpressive.
Leonard Maltin – 1.5 stars – An evil djinn (genie to you) is freed from captivity in a gem and sets out to grant (backfiring) wishes while seeking Lauren, because granting her wishes will enable him to destroy the world … or something. The mythology is too complex, the story too thin, and the plentiful gore mostly gratuitous. Followed by three direct-to-video sequels.
(Well we are watching one of those sequels. I do love overly complex lore. I think a horror film immediately jumping into the lore is just a funny idea. Usually, they make one good film without any lore, and then the sequels ruin it with too much lore. Seems like they skipped the first step and just made a bad lore-filled film instead.)
(So basically this is the classic tale of the genie who grants you bad wishes, but taken to the extreme of making the wishes kill you in horrifying ways or something? I mean … great idea for a horror franchise if I’m being honest. It isn’t a surprise Wes Craven produced it.)
Directors – Robert Kurtzman – (Known For: The Demolitionist; Deadly Impact; Buried Alive; The Rage; BMT: Wishmaster; Notes: He penned the story for From Dusk Til Dawn and then paid Tarentino to write the full script. He has 128 make-up credits to his name, so horror is his bread and butter. And yes, he has a make-up credit here.)
Writers – Peter Atkins – (Known For: Hellbound: Hellraiser II; Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth; Fist of the North Star; Prisoners of the Sun; BMT: Wishmaster; Hellraiser: Bloodline; Notes: Was in a theater group with Clive Barker and he indeed actually wrote the Hellraiser theatrical sequels. He only wrote the first Wishmaster, although he has character credits for the rest of the series.)
Actors – Tammy Lauren – (Known For: The Last Flight of Noah’s Ark; Chains of Gold; Tiger Warsaw; Future BMT: Radioland Murders; Mad City; BMT: Wishmaster; Notes: Was one of the stars of the period television drama Homefront. She’s has lot of recurring roles on television over the years, including a seven episode run on Home Improvement.)
Andrew Divoff – (Known For: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull; The Hunt for Red October; Air Force One; Vault; Faust; Oblivion; Neon Maniacs; Xtro 3: Watch the Skies; Adrenalin: Fear the Rush; Dangerous Touch; Blue Hill Avenue; Lockdown; Extreme Justice; The Rage; Oblivion 2: Backlash; Touch Me; Hong Kong 97; Down ‘n Dirty; Night of the Living Dead 3D: Re-Animation; Treasure Raiders; Future BMT: Toy Soldiers; American Dreamz; A Low Down Dirty Shame; BMT: Wishmaster; Mac and Me; Another 48 Hrs.; Graveyard Shift; Notes: Y’all know Andrew Divoff. Oh wait … maybe you don’t. He’s a huge direct-to-video action star from the 90s and is all over a ton of television shows in guest spots over the years. I just watched him in Criminal Minds … don’t watch that episode though, it is ultra racist.)
Angus Scrimm – (Known For: Phantasm; Chopping Mall; John Dies at the End; Phantasm II; Phantasm: Ravager; The Lost Empire; Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead; Deadfall; Phantasm IV: Oblivion; Mindwarp; Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story; Munchie; I Sell the Dead; A Piece of the Action; Sweet Kill; Transylvania Twist; Witches’ Brew; Scream Bloody Murder; Disciples; Jim, the World’s Greatest; BMT: Wishmaster; Notes: Unusually tall and slender he played the “tall man” character from Phantasm in many parody commercials and shorts over the years as a staple of the horror genre.)
Budget/Gross – $5 million / Domestic: $15,738,769 (Worldwide: $15,738,769)
(That is pretty good. I’m a bit surprised they didn’t try and go back to the well for a second try at the big box office take and instead ended up straight-to-video for the rest of the series.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 25% (8/32): Wishmaster searches for horror in the exploits of a supernatural being — one whose powers, alas, evidently do not include the ability to summon a compelling script.
(Man the reviews are dire. Bad acting, bad special effects, bad writing, and laugh-inducing instead of scream-inducing.)
Reviewer Highlight: An extravaganza of bad special effects and worse acting – Peter Stack, San Francisco Chronicle
(I like the general mood of the poster. Start red mixed with eerie black and all that. The font could be a little better and it kind of looks more like a vampire flick than a djinn flick. I mean, the picture on the poster really looks nothing like the monster in the film.)
Tagline(s) – Be careful what you wish for. (D)
(Well duh. Gotta ding this for creativity… and really everything about it. It’s just a common phrase. Nothing more or nothing less.)
Top 10: Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf (2021), The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Beetlejuice (1988), It (2017), Scooby-Doo (2002), Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), Moana (2016), Shazam! (2019)
Future BMT: 71.1 Supergirl (1984), 64.5 Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie (1997), 61.2 Scooby-Doo (2002), 56.3 The New Mutants (2020), 51.6 Dylan Dog: Dead of Night (2010), 49.7 Sleepwalkers (1992), 47.7 The Dark Tower (2017), 45.9 Jeepers Creepers 2 (2003), 44.5 Wrath of the Titans (2012), 41.2 Clash of the Titans (2010)
BMT: Hellboy (2019), Gods of Egypt (2016), Warcraft (2016), Conan the Barbarian (2011), Eragon (2006), R.I.P.D. (2013), Seventh Son (2014), Jason X (2001), Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993), Slender Man (2018), Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988), The Golden Child (1986), Wishmaster (1997), A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989), The Bye Bye Man (2017), I, Frankenstein (2014), Alone in the Dark (2005)
Matches: The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf (2021), It Chapter Two (2019), Hercules (1997), Legend (1985), Hellboy (2004), Wrath of the Titans (2012), Pumpkinhead (1988), Wishmaster (1997), I, Frankenstein (2014), Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust (2000), Cellar Dweller (1987), Pumpkinhead II: Blood Wings (1993), The Monster Project (2017), Slaughterhouse Rock (1987), The Snow Queen (2013), The Demon’s Rook (2013)
(I did a two-fer here because it seemed interesting. Obviously things like The Witcher probably have a demon and a monster. But then things like Cellar Dweller has a genuine demon-monster. Probably not a terrible way to discover related films in the end. Really glad Pumpkinhead II shows up here.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 21) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Robert Englund is No. 4 billed in Wishmaster and No. 10 billed in Urban Legend, which also stars Alicia Witt (No. 1 billed) who is in 88 Minutes (No. 2 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (4 + 10) + (1 + 2) + (3 + 1) = 21. If we were to watch A Low Down Dirty Shame, and Kingdom Come we can get the HoE Number down to 18.
Notes – One of the statues in Raymond Beaumont’s (Robert Englund’s) room with the statues is a statue of Pazuzu from The Exorcist (1973).
Many crew members, including Director Robert Kurtzman (man killed by piano), had small roles in the film, sometimes appearing in different scenes as different characters.
Characters named Finney, Beaumont, Derleth, and Merritt are all references to early twentieth century science fiction or horror writers, Jack Finney, Charles Beaumont, August Derleth, and Abraham Merritt.
Features numerous horror movie actors, including Robert Englund (the “A Nightmare on Elm Street” films), Angus Scrimm (Phantasm (1979)), Tony Todd (Night of the Living Dead (1990), the Candyman (1992) movies), Kane Hodder (various “Friday the 13th” and “Jason” movies), Reggie Bannister (Phantasm (1979)) and Ted Raimi (Darkman (1990), Army of Darkness (1992)).
“Wishmaster was a great experience….I had a very short schedule and had to deliver the film into theatres in 6 months start to finish so it was very stressful but very fulfilling. Sam Raimi actually recommended me for the film and after a half a dozen meeting with the studio I got the job. I had to go in and pitch my take on the film and its design. We shot it in 33 days in LA which was tough as we had dozens of locations all around the city so we had a lot of company moves. We had hundreds of FX which was a bit of a challenge as the schedule was tight. I was very lucky to find Andrew Divoff and Tammy Lauren. Divoff is a very close friend who I enjoy working with on whatever we can find together. We now have this second hand when we work together.” (Backwoods Horror interview with Robert Kurtzman in 2009)
Greg Nicotero, one of the special effects creator for Wishmaster, also worked on special effects in Romero’s 1985 movie Day of the Dead (and he played the character of Pvt. Johnson). Joseph Pilato, who played the drunk crane worker in Wishmaster, was the main villain in Day of the Dead (as Captain Rhodes).
According to a 2016 interview with PopHorror, it took 3.5 hours to get into costume with 1.5 hours to get out according to lead star Andrew Divoff. He also said his favorite scenes for the film were the ones where he shared scenes with his monstrous brethren.
Jack Sholder was approached to direct Wishmaster (1997) but declined as he felt the script wasn’t very good. When it came to the sequel, he was asked to direct it which he also turned down until the producers told him that he could write the screenplay for Wishmaster 2: Evil Never Dies (1999) and, despite having to follow some basic guidelines, he could have creative freedom with the story.
Cassie is off to college for one last hurrah with her boyfriend, Sean. But when a car accident leaves him dead she feels like she’s going crazy. Add to that a hovering ex-boyfriend, an antagonistic BFF, Sean’s spooky ghost, and a whole lotta creepy guys following her and she really feels insane. Can she uncover the truth before it’s too late? Find out in… Soul Survivors.
How?! Cassie and Annabel are BFFs going off to college. Tagging along for the first weekend is Cassie’s ex-boyfriend, Matt, and her new boyfriend, Sean. It’s a pretty boring weekend until Annabel suggests a weirdo rave and everyone is like coooool. Off they go where they dance the night away having a grand old time. At the end of the night a jealous Matt convinces Cassie that he needs one last kiss (you know, for closure) and she’s like, fine. But, uh oh! Sean saw and he’s a bit jelly. In the car they fight and a distracted Cassie ends up crashing. A few weeks later Cassie is mourning the death of Sean at school. She is struggling to keep up with her classes, Annabel is like ‘get over it’, and she’s starting to see ghosts and a couple of real creepy dudes she recognizes from the night of the crash. Fearing some sort of occult conspiracy and feeling like she is being chased she ends up fainting and being saved by a kind priest. The next day Matt arrives and starts to care for her in a definitely not creepy way… for sure not a hovering weirdo. Anyway, Cassie continues to see the creepy dudes everywhere and even starts to get a suspicion that Matt is in cahoots with the creepy dudes. Ultimately after a bunch of other nonsense happens and despite her fears about Matt, she asks him to drive her home. Instead he takes her back to the rave place and she’s like “what thuuuuu,” and tries to escape. It’s then that she (and we the audience, who never saw this coming for sure) learn that all the events of the film have been but a dream (what a twist!). A dream occurring in the final moments of Cassie’s life in the hospital after the crash. It’s all led to this question: does she want to live? And she’s like hellllll, yeah. Check out her boyfriend. He’s Casey Affleck… Ben Affleck’s brother. So… uh… yeah… she wants to live. THE END.
Why?! I mean, I could be snide and say, “seriously, what was the point of this totally ridiculous movie that meant nothing because none of it actually happened?”… and I will. But I’ll also say that the point is really about life and love and what makes someone want to live. Matt and Annabel are also fighting for their lives but in the end they are seduced by the weirdo rave people because they promise better things for them (for Matt it’s being with Cassie, for Annabel it’s being free). Cassie though has Sean waiting for her and that is what she chooses.
Who?! There are a couple credits that go to “Jump Rope Twins” which I don’t really recall much about in the film. I went back and looked and literally it’s just some twins in a school yard that are jumping rope… not a hallucination or anything. Cassie just sort of smiles at them and goes on her way. Weird. But at least this can now win Best Twin Film award.
What?! This is a pretty major twist. In fact it’s one of the holy grails of what we are looking for in a BMT twist-em-up. Some of the best of all time have employed this tragic mistake of a plot device (i.e. I Know Who Killed Me), so always a treat. Bonus points for being obvious from the jump.
Where?! It’s hard to pin down in a fun kind of way. From the license plates in the beginning they are from Illinois. They are heading East since Matt is tagging along on his way to Harvard, while Sean has to then fly out to California. Given the name of the college (Middleton) I presumed it was some play on Middlebury and we are in the Northeast. All checks other than Sean saying he’ll be 2000 miles away in CA. Likely just an estimate, but pretty vague overall. Interesting too that we see the characters drinking some Goose Island at one point that totally gives away they they filmed in Illinois and Indiana. D, cause it is fun to try to figure out.
When?! I agree with Patrick that it does appear that there is a September 2001 calendar indicating that the film takes place around September 26th. However, I would like to also point out that that’s bullshit. It’s also clear that she took her midterm on the 19th of some month. So she had a midterm on September 19th? Also there are children that jump out screaming trick or treat in costumes… in September? Also… ALSO… it’s all a dream. So this doesn’t matter. B… I mean it’s still a secret holiday film even if it’s a secret dream holiday film.
This is as close to not being an actual film as we get. Narratively it resembles a baffling dream more than a horror film and indeed about four seconds into the film you can be pretty sure none of it is actually happening. “It was all a dream,” is such a bad movie twist that you rarely actually see it in the wild, and yet… Soul Survivors exists. They probably should have just trashed it at some point. The acting wasn’t good, the story was a mish-mash of nonsensical sequences held together by a thread (or perhaps not held together at all), and ultimately the twist meant everything was meaningless. So of course I loved it! It is a truly horrid piece of BMT cinema! A relic of the Scream high school/college horror bonanza that (rightfully) barely qualified for BMT as a wide release. I’m a real sucker for a high school/college setting, but even that couldn’t rescue this dog poo. Like Half Past Dead from last week I think this film will get some play at the year end awards, but for very different reasons. Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! We got spooky ghosts. We got a barely-there Luke Wilson. We got (checks notes) Melissa Sagemiller. We got Soul Survivors! Let’s go!
P’s View on the Preview – For a bit while reading the preview I thought “uh oh … this looks like a trite horror film from the 2000s.” But it does have a lot of cred. Top 10 BMeTric for 2001, a sub-10% on Rotten Tomatoes, a BOMB by Leonard Maltin. It is doing everything you want it to do. What were my expectations? I was obviously hoping for a The Fog (2005) situation, but secretly dreading that it was actually just going to be boring.
The Good – Hmmmmmmmmmm. Nothing I don’t think. I literally can’t think of a single thing they did well in this film, which is kind of mind blowing to think about. The only thing maybe is the goth aesthetic they have going for it? That is a very late-90s to early-00s thing and in a way it is a bit charming to see on screen 20 years later. Best Bit: Goth aesthetic.
The Bad – My god, let me count them. The two main actors aren’t as good as their supporting actors. It cribs from about five different horror films (not all of them good). The soundtrack is an abomination. Maybe back in 2001 it was a different story, but I made a YouTube playlist from the soundtrack to get a feeling for it and wooooooooof. Let’s just say I’m not a fan, a lot of death metal or whatever that genre is and I’m just not a fan. The bad guys are also just a weird choice, and the direction makes the film feel chopped to shit and borderline incomprehensible. I would call it incomprehensible, but because all of the ideas are stolen from other films it is actually pretty easy to follow. Fatal Flaw: Dare I? I do, the soundtrack makes me sad and I hate it, sorry.
The BMT – There is a long list of bad stuff and I got into it a bit, but the film is very flat and just kind of happens while you sit there wondering when they are going to reveal that she is in a world between life and death … because about 20 minutes in it is abundantly obvious that that is where it is going. It is a really bad horror film, but also not so bad that I would want to watch it again, so where does that leave us? With a flat kind of boring but genuinely dog poo in my face film I think. Notable for the year, but probably not to BMT overall. Did it meet my expectations? Yes, blessedly not as boring as it could have been. Just enough interestingly bad choices to keep me a bit entertained.
Roast-radamus – Eagle eyes Jamie with the Bad Movie Twin (Who?) as well for jump rope twins which I’ll add here for posterity. A fun Setting as a Character (Where?) for Middleton College, which is somewhere within driving distance of Chicago. A weird Super Secret Holiday Film (When?) because we see Trick or Treaters … but it is also by all accounts September, but also a dream? Which brings us to obviously the worst of the Worst Twist (How?) for the reveal that it was all a dreaaaaaaaam. Otherwise just closest to BMT I think, as I said, just enough bizarre choices to keep viewers entertained.
Sequel, Prequel, Remake – Are you ready for that Sequel / crossover that no one was asking for? That’s right, we get to see what happened to Sasha Petrosevitch in Half Past Dead in the time between when he is shot and almost killed and when he becomes Half Past Dead! He goes to the in-between world where Ja Rule keeps trying to get him to stop jacking cars and come back to life with him, and his dead wife is smooching on him and trying to get him to stay with her in this definitely-not-death-ghost-world. All the time he’s getting back into Akito, dropping the pounds, and feeling better about himself every day. Could death be so bad when you look and feel so good and are smooching your wife every day? But in the end with the help of Ja Rule he realizes he has unfinished business in the real world, smooches his wife, and returns to the land of the living. Soul Survivors 2: Dead O’Clock.
You Just Got Schooled – At a loss for Melissa Sagemiller bangers I had to just turn to a similarly gothy film from the era, The Craft which I had never seen. The cast is stacked though. Neve Campbell (who says “sooory” with such a thick Canadian accent I didn’t even need to check that she is Canadian), Fairuza Balk (from The Waterboy), Robin Tunney (about to hit her apex with Supernova and Vertical Limit), with Christine Taylor and Skeet Ulrich in smaller roles! That’s a pretty solid cast top to bottom right there. And the film is good. I liked the good vs. bad witch thing they got going, and they didn’t bother really dealing with hanging a franchise off of it like they definitely would have these days. B+. Holds up well even 25 years later.
Oh man, so I got in a huge blow up with my girlfriend and was distraught and distracted on the road and wouldn’t you know it? I flipped my SUV and got into a terrible accident where I bopped my head pretty hard. Naturally I can’t remember a thing (because of ghosts, you know?). Do you remember what happened in Soul Survivors?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) Cassie and Sean are young high school sweethearts saying goodbye as college begins. Why are they saying goodbye, where are they going?
2) Then they become Soul Survivors after a traumatic event. What event?
3) After having what looks to be a super fun paint fight, Cassie falls asleep and has what looks like a really fun dream. What happens in the dream?
4) Luckily Cassie meets a nice priest named Father Jude. But there is something off with Father Jude that she learns from the other father at the church?
5) In the end how does Cassie survive?
Bonus Question: How long do Cassie and Sean stay together after the tragic events of the film?
Jamie, Patrick, Kyle and little Baby Niles race through the streets of New Jersey trying to evade the powerful enemies that Kyle’s son Niall has made. They Tokyo drift everywhere and a bullet shatters the back windshield. Baby Niles wails in terror as Kyle does his best to calm him. Suddenly a car pulls up to the side of them and a guy in a real dopey plastic mask stares back at them. “What thuuuuuuu…” Jamie says, transfixed by the dopiness of the mask. But he’s soon snapped back to reality as Patrick screams out, “watch the road you dumbo!” Jamie’s eyes dart back in time to see an oil slick ahead, seeping out from an overturned sardine truck. Oh woe is them! Unless Jamie is some kind of El Diablo behind the wheel, ready to set fire to the road in pursuit of justice and fambly, then there’s no way they can get out of this jam. Psych! Jamie is exactly that kind of El Diablo and he drifts right through that sardine oil and splashes it all over that weirdo mask guy to boot. They all high five a bunch as they make their escape. But as they are high fiving they fail to realize the dopey mask guy has pulled out a sniper rifle. With a loud pop their back tire explodes and they start spinning out of control. Thinking fast, Jamie furiously turns the wheel in time to put the car into a semi-controlled spin. He aims for a nearby tree that could stop their momentum and save them from certain death. With a crash everything goes black.
4 weeks later
Jamie, having miraculously survived the crash, cries softly as he looks at the only picture of him, Patrick, Kyle and Baby Niles. That’s right! We are watching Soul Survivors… that movie that everyone remembers. You know, the one… where they are sole survivors… anyway, it got really terrible reviews and it’s probably about time we watched it. Let’s go!
StreetCreditReport.com –BMeTric: top 4.0%; Notability: top 74.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 0.5% Higher BMeT: Glitter, Jason X, Freddy Got Fingered, Driven, The Animal, Ghosts of Mars, Black Knight, Valentine, Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles; Higher Notability: Pearl Harbor, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Monkeybone, Hannibal, Ghosts of Mars, Impostor, Not Another Teen Movie, Bubble Boy, Swordfish, 15 Minutes, Town & Country, The One, Scary Movie 2, The Affair of the Necklace, America’s Sweethearts, I Am Sam, 3000 Miles to Graceland, Along Came a Spider, Chelsea Walls, Joe Dirt, and 58 more; Lower RT: Texas Rangers; Notes: My god, sub-4.0 is so low, no wonder this film I’ve never heard of has a 60+ BMeTric. And holy crap, this rounds out the top-10 as far as BMeTric for 2001 and I have definitely seen nine of them (although I don’t think we’ve officially watched The Animal for BMT, I think I’ve just watched it multiple times by myself …))
Leonard Maltin – BOMB – A young woman and her three friends have one last night of celebration before going their separate ways for college. Unfortunately, something goes terribly wrong. Supernatural, horror, teensploitation, reality/fantasy grab bag set to pulsing music, this movie shamelessly steals ideas from good movies – and bad ones too. So-called “Killer Cut” is rated R.
(Uh oh … this sounds suspiciously like it is going to be trite nonsense. Which can be fun, but usually isn’t very fun for horror. For horror you want absurdity like Lindsay Lohan with a robot arm and a robot leg for example.)
(Uh oh … I think this might be trite nonsense like Maltin suggested. Like … she’s dead or almost dead or the only one alive right? It is one of those three, it can’t be anything else. Also the acting looks dire. Only Dushku looks like she’s doing anything special in this. And the soundtrack!! There is a lot to digest with this terrible terrible trailer.)
Directors – Stephen Carpenter – (Known For: The Dorm That Dripped Blood; The Kindred; The Power; BMT: Soul Survivors; Notes: Ultimately probably most well known for creating the hit television show Grimm (and some of the spin off mini-series and such).)
Writers – Stephen Carpenter (written by) (as Steve Carpenter) – (Known For: The Dorm That Dripped Blood; The Kindred; The Power; Future BMT: The Man; Blue Streak; BMT: Soul Survivors; Notes: Allegedly created the first draft for the Ocean’s 11 remake, although he ended up not being credited obviously.)
Actors – Melissa Sagemiller – (Known For: Get Over It; The Clearing; Standing Still; Love Object; Future BMT: Sorority Boys; BMT: Soul Survivors; Mr. Woodcock; The Guardian; Notes: Her father played for the NFL, and he mother was Jimmy Carter’s campaign finance manager. She began as a model and now mostly does television, for example she was briefly the DA during a later season of Law & Order: SVU.)
Wes Bentley – (Known For: Interstellar; The Hunger Games; The Best of Enemies; American Beauty; Mission: Impossible – Fallout; Knight of Cups; Pete’s Dragon; Lovelace; The Four Feathers; Final Girl; Broken Vows; Beloved; Welcome to Me; The Claim; The Game of Their Lives; Rites of Passage; Unconscious; There Be Dragons; Dolan’s Cadillac; Pioneer; Future BMT: Gone; P2; We Are Your Friends; Underworld: Awakening; BMT: Jonah Hex; Soul Survivors; Ghost Rider; Notes: Was discovered during an open casting call for Rent, and was nominated for a BAFTA for his supporting role in American Beauty.)
Casey Affleck – (Known For: Interstellar; Gone Baby Gone; American Pie; Good Will Hunting; Ocean’s Eleven; Our Friend; The World to Come; Every Breath You Take; Manchester by the Sea; American Pie 2; Tower Heist; Ocean’s Twelve; Ocean’s Thirteen; Triple 9; The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford; A Ghost Story; To Die For; Out of the Furnace; The Finest Hours; The Old Man & The Gun; Future BMT: Drowning Mona; 200 Cigarettes; Race the Sun; BMT: Soul Survivors; Notes: Won an Oscar for Manchester by the Sea (and was nominated for The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford). You know Affleck, he’s Ben’s brother. Notably got called out during the Me Too movement for hostile set environments on some of his films.)
(Oh wow, even on the usual shoestring budget for teen horror films this still didn’t even get close to breaking even. Even if the budget was inflated after it was clearly not a success (likely), there is no way this would have cost the $2 million it would have needed to even get close. A huge bomb.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 4% (2/48): Soul Survivors’ stock characters and utter lack of suspense gives viewers little reason to attempt deciphering the confusing plot.
(Wow, the film continues to grow in cred. I basically had never heard of it, but sub-10% on RT is nothing to joke around about. And … I doubt the plot is all that confusing, if we are being honest. Reviewer Highlight: Blatantly cannibalising every horror movie it can think of in the attempt to produce some patchwork Frankenstein’s monster. – Jamie Russell, BBC)
(I like the cool blue, but the font isn’t great and it fits perfectly into the “generic horror film poster” set up. Reminiscent of the Scream Franchise. The most interesting aspect is the ordering of the actors. Melissa Sagemiller is way in the back. She’s the main character! Look at this alternate poster… she’s not even on it! Luke Wilson’s name appears instead! My god. I think it’s a C.)
Tagline(s) – The World of the Dead and the World of the Living… are About to Collide. (D)
(Boooo. I get the idea but poor execution… which is probably what you can say about a lot of this film. I can’t in good conscience give this even an OK grade, even if the cadence is fine for the length.)
Top 10: Midsommar (2019), The Little Things (2021), The Father (2020), Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), The Game (1997), Joker (2019), Suicide Squad (2016), Inception (2010), Chaos Walking (2021), The Big Lebowski (1998)
Future BMT: 89.4 Vampires Suck (2010), 82.8 Prom Night (2008), 70.0 The Unborn (2009), 67.8 Poltergeist (2015), 67.0 Halloween II (2009), 65.6 Pulse (2006), 63.0 Smokey and the Bandit Part 3 (1983), 60.9 Darkness Falls (2003), 60.7 A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010), 60.3 Brahms: The Boy II (2020);
BMT: Hellboy (2019), Fantasy Island (2020), Sucker Punch (2011), Batman & Robin (1997), Friday the 13th (2009), Event Horizon (1997), The Bodyguard (1992), The Mummy (2017), The Covenant (2006), After Earth (2013), The Last Witch Hunter (2015), Safe Haven (2013), Assassin’s Creed (2016), Seventh Son (2014), The Lone Ranger (2013), Truth or Dare (2018), The Golden Child (1986), Slender Man (2018), 10,000 BC (2008), Ghosts of Mars (2001), Max Payne (2008), Son of the Mask (2005), The Forest (2016), The Number 23 (2007), The Lawnmower Man (1992), I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998), Flatliners (2017), Dreamcatcher (2003), Silent Hill: Revelation (2012), Dracula 2001 (2000), Ride Along 2 (2016), The Wicker Man (2006), The Rite (2011), Solarbabies (1986), Rings (2017), A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child (1989), The Ring 2 (2005), Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989), Toys (1992)
(The keywords falling off a cliff is so common I have to think it is because it takes a bunch of years for anything but the biggest films to gain enough edits to cover them all. Nonsense keyword in realist, but The Unborn I think is, at least, a real one. Mostly horror films as you would expect, with probably The Unborn being one of the biggest ones we haven’t watched yet.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 13) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Wes Bentley is No. 2 billed in Soul Survivors and No. 3 billed in Ghost Rider, which also stars Nicolas Cage (No. 1 billed) who is in The Wicker Man (No. 1 billed), which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 5 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => 2 + 3 + 1 + 1 + 5 + 1 = 13. If we were to watch 200 Cigarettes, and Pearl Harbor we can get the HoE Number down to 12.
Notes – James Marsden turned down the role of Sean in favor of the part of Scott Summers/Cyclops in X-Men (2000). (Good choice)
Casey Affleck has gone on record to reveal that this movie and Drowning Mona (2000) were his two least favorite films on which he has worked.
Rachel is already a bit of an outcast, so when her BFF commits suicide and she ends up in the corsshairs of the coolest kids in school things go from bad to worse. Unfortunately for them Rachel isn’t any ordinary girl and her rage unlocks her supernatural powers. Can her rage be stopped (and maybe still get the guy) before it’s too late? Find out in… The Rage: Carrie 2.
How?! Rachel isn’t Carrie, which is confusing given the title of the film. But don’t worry, she’s Carrie’s sister, so that makes sense… other than the timeline being decades off. Anywho, forget all that. Just remember that Rachel is Carrie and totally has telekinetic powers. This will become relevant much later in the story, though, because at first she’s just a regular ol’ high school student. When her best friend commits suicide as a direct result of a group of football players’ gross game of hooking up with as many girls as possible, Rachel turns over some photographic evidence against one of them. This puts her in the crosshairs of the gang’s ire and as a result the school guidance counselor, who knew the original Carrie, gets increasingly concerned. Meanwhile, one of the popular guys, Jesse, begins to grow close to Rachel and he tries to stop his fellow players from bullying her. They all agree and play nice, but it’s all a ruse. They plan a romantic getaway for Jesse and Rachel and secretly film it. Then they set it up so after a big football game Rachel is whisked away to the post-game party without Jesse. Stranded with her tormentors, they play the tape of her and Jesse’s tryst much to her embarrassment… and rage! With her powers revealed she totally destroys everyone and the whole party becomes a scene of horror. Jesse arrives at the last moment and is able to calm her down enough to stop the horror, but Rachel is crushed when the house they are in collapses. Years later we see that Jesse is still terrorized by his memories of Rachel thus starting the cycle towards Carrie 3: Still Ragin’. THE END.
Why?! Rachel just seems to want to live her life, but it’s hard when you have supernatural powers that you are trying to keep in check. Everyone else wants to either help or hurt her and not much in between. Obviously this doesn’t turn out great for everyone involved.
Who?! We get some nice archival footage here in order to tie everything to the original Carrie. Sissy Spacek obviously makes an appearance in these flashbacks and is immediately the biggest star in the film. The only other notable thing is that the primary antagonist is played by Dylan Bruno who happened to go to MIT graduating in 1994 with a degree in Environmental Engineering. He then played a character on Numb3rs that also went to MIT. Fun facts.
What?! The “sex book” angle was an interesting one. It’s a ripped-from-the-headlines trope that comes up with regularity in tv and film. In a wild coincidence I was also watching Riverdale at the same time and the third episode of that show is also a “sex book” plot. It’s based on a California event about a group of high schoolers who called themselves the Spur Posse and I’ll just stop there. Terrible people and a terrible name.
Where?! There is an aspect of the plot that would likely necessitate it takes place in California, but I’m not going to go into that mostly because they make it clear it takes place in the same town as the original Carrie. That film is no doubt set in Maine and as a result I won’t even entertain the possibility that this one isn’t set in Maine. So Maine it is. It’s worth mentioning though that the film was not originally written as a sequel to Carrie, but rather was changed to fit the Carrie lore. So likely the original script was set in California. B-.
When?! It’s the beginning of the football season so we know it’s early Fall. There are a bunch of football schedules posted around town in a bunch of scenes that declare “We Support Bulldog Football.” In one such scene it appears like the first game of the season occurs on September 27th… so that is somewhat of an exact date and makes sense with the rest of film. It’s always fun to find something like this B-.
There were two things I kinda dug about this film. One is that I realized that I’m a sucker for any kind of high school drama. I actually would have almost preferred this was just an episode of The OC and all the paranormal mumbo jumbo didn’t factor in. But alas… it’s unfortunately a Carrie sequel. The second is that I appreciated that they went for it in the final scene. It needed to be fun and horror-like in order to make up for the complete lack of any of that stuff for 95% of the run time. It did a pretty good job on delivering. Gory with some fun kills. As for absolutely everything else in the film? Amateur hour. Second week in a row where I was scratching my head wondering how this even made it to theaters. But that wasn’t the worst bit. It’s the half-hearted attempt to make a Carrie sequel out of something that clearly wasn’t written as such. Rachel even being Carrie’s half sister is quite the stretch given that in the book Carrie’s dad is long dead and even in the movie he’s long gone having run out on the family. So you’re saying he came back to town, impregnated another woman and then ran away again… by why? Why the same exact town? Makes you wonder whether you could even make a telekinetic high school student film… or would it be rejected from the jump because it’s too similar to Carrie? Is that plot now totally off the table other than the occasional film they then retcon into a bullshit sequel? Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Carrie was so nice they made it twice. Only the second time it was considerably worse and about goths and stuff. Let’s go!
P’s View on the Preview – The trailer looks like a television movie. It has television actors in it. It is a sequel to a beloved horror film from the 70s based on a beloved horror book by the quintessential horror author. And yet … it was released to theaters. The 90s man. What were my expectations? Uh … well, I fully expected to just watch Carrie again, but with cheesy 90s trash thrown everywhere and probably a heavy metal soundtrack maybe? A remake in all but name.
The Good – The reskin of the Carrie story works in its own 90s way. The outsider goes from being a sheltered weirdo, to, effectively, a goth. Combine that with the bizarre aggressiveness of the football team and the whole package works … as a television movie. All of this is “good” in the sense that all of this is not released to theaters as a Carrie sequel. I think it is important to make that caveat. Best Bit: The main character.
The Bad – Rachel being Carrie’s half-sister is an obvious twist that begs way more questions than it answers and provides no interesting lore. Like … is Ralph White telekinetic? Is it genetic? Do all of his children have this gift? Are there other strange psychic powers in this world (… does this take place in the world of The Shining, I guess I would think so)? They are interesting questions, but the twist is so half-hearted that it gives nothing in return. The ripped-from-the-headlines sex book is gross, a pretty bleak blast-from-the-past. And the direction is terrible, a hodge-podge of restless camera movements and unnecessary black-and-white nonsense. Fatal Flaw: Dumb twist.
The BMT – If this was merely a made-for-television sequel/remake of Carrie it would be a whole lotta nothing. But as a genuine released-to-theaters sequel to Carrie it is an abomination. I wanted very much to like a lot of the film, especially the somewhat interesting Rachel as played by Emily Bergl, but the entire thing feels like a weird joke. Almost a parody of the source material / Stephen King in general. Did it meet my expectations? Yeah, it is basically a Carrie clone masquerading as a sequel. I guess they do a decent job in updating the main character / triggering event to something a bit more 90s (goth / secret sex tape), but that is about it.
Roast-radamus – In reality the only good superlative is Worst Twist (How?) for the inevitable reveal that our orphaned hero Rachel is Carrie’s half-sister. Closest to Bad in the end I think, as much as I wanted to find all of this very amusing, it is kind of a nothing movie that I could never see myself watching ever again.
Sequel, Prequel, Remake – Well … we’ve already had a sequel and a remake to Carrie. So I guess we are just left with a prequel. And Ralph White is ripe for the big screen treatment. Let’s see, given Carrie’s age in the book it isn’t absurd to think that Ralph White could have been involved in World War II, so let’s go with that. He’s a soldier in the European theater during the push to Berlin near the end of the war. While travelling through a German village he meets a young woman who he falls in love with. But tragedy strikes, his platoon mates (who despise him), are determined to play a trick on him during the final night in the town (the same night he and the young woman consummate their tryst). Embarrassing Ralph (they’re all going to laugh at you! But in german) he goes insane and levels the town. The army is convinced that Ralph is just the lucky survivor of one of the final battles of the war, and he is sent home, disillusioned about love with his new power awakened. But, what a twist! We see later that the young woman miraculously survived … as did her child, destined to have the same powers that Ralph has! Ba-ba-baaaaaaaaaaaa. Carrie: Origins is basically the only good name, although an amusingly cryptic and simple Ralph White would also be fun. Everyone would be like “am I supposed to know who Ralph White is? Oh, it’s Carrie’s dad? Weird.”
So here’s what happened. There was this super rad party at school. I didn’t really know anyone there, but it was at a sweet house, super rad. And then all of a sudden they started making fun of this girl. Really not chill, but like … margaritas, amirite? Anyways, I don’t remember what happened because I got hit in the head with a log or something. Do you remember what happened in The Rage: Carrie 2?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) Why does Lisa kill herself?
2) How do they find out that Eric, one of super cool dudes, was involved?
3) What traumatic event brings Rachel and Jesse together?
4) Why does Rachel have telekinetic powers?
5) What triggers the explosive event this time?
Bonus Question: So, what does Jesse major in in college?
Bad Movie Twins 