In the opening scene of PRINCE OF DARKNESS we find an old priest in bed, breathing his last;
on his stomach rests a silver box. In the box is a key, which fits the lock to a room which houses
something very, very bad. In fact, the room holds none other than Satan himself! And
what could be worse than Satan getting loose? Why, Satan getting loose and letting something REALLY
nasty into the world!
And this, kiddies, is the jist of PRINCE OF DARKNESS. In the wake of Father Calder's (the old
priest) death, another priest (simply billed as "Priest" in the credits, and played by Donald Pleasence) sets
about deciphering just what the old priest was up to. Turns out Father Calder was a member of "The
Brotherhood of Sleep", a highly secret and very powerful sect for which Father Calder acted as the guardian,
living in a closed-down church somewhere in Los Angeles. Every day, Father Calder took the aforementioned key,
opened the door to the aforementioned room, and observed a big, ornate glass and silver tank-like structure
containing a swirling, evil-looking green liquid. But according to his journal, the
liquid has only recently become active, a matter which he was going to speak to the Cardinal about but died before
his appointment. Talk about rotten luck!
Well, Priest has gathered from Father Calder's journal that the evil-looking liquid is, in fact, Satan, and
the recent activity indicates that Old Scratch is preparing to unloose himself upon the earth! Well,
he knows that if he tries to tell the general public that the devil is on his way they'll lock him away in a looney
bin. So, he enlists a physics professor, some of his best students, and a handful of other students of
various fields to provide scientific proof that it IS actually the antichrist in the container.
Now, the students aren't told what the focus of their research will be -- they're just told to show up at
the old church (St. Godards) with various equipment, and plan to spend the weekend. But the promise of high marks
for extra credit is a powerful thing (just ask any college student, let alone grad students) so they comply,
even though they don't know just what it is they're supposed to be studying. And the activity
at St. Godards church has attracted the attention of a group of homeless people (led by none other than Alice Cooper! Ah!
THERE'S the metal connection!) who stand around watching the students, holding cups full of maggots, and just
generally being creepy.
That afternoon, the students are shown what they are researching, and they are all duly impressed. But
when the results of their various research starts to indicate that it really IS Satan in the container, they start
to get a little worried. In addition to that, other weird things are happening: Worms start
crawling, en mass, on the outside of the windows, the homeless people are standing motionless around the church,
just staring, and every time someone falls asleep, they have the same dream about a dark, ominous figure in the front
of St. Godards. Oh! And one of the students bumps her arm on a piece of equipment and it raises
a bruise shaped like something off a Blue Oyster Cult album! Scary!!
The story continues to unfold in a slow, complicated manner, incorporating swarming bugs, demons, supernovas, ancient
scriptures and zombies into the plot. We even get to see Alice Cooper spear a computer nerd with a bicycle (and TELL
me there aren't a bunch of you out there who would enjoy doing that!) Ultimately, however, the movie
culminates in a "good versus evil" showdown that is both boring and predictable.
| RATING: |
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PRINCE OF DARKNESS started out quite well: It had an intelligent, even feasible (for a horror
movie) plot, and parts of it actually really scared me. Unfortunately, as is often the case, about 2/3 of
the way into the movie it starts to unravel, and the ending is messy, unoriginal and uninteresting. But
casting Alice Cooper as a homeless psycho was a stroke of genius!
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None. |
SCENES THAT MAKE ME GO "HMMM...,":
| 1. |
Does anyone else out there think that
Donald Pleasence looks an awful lot like the late Anton LeVey?
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| 2. |
In the scene where Susan the radiologist
sees the container holding the satanic green fluid, she notes that the container is actually leaking the
fluid, which flows upward and hovers along the ceiling. And what is she doing while looking at
this phenomenon? Naturally, she is holding her mouth open! Am I the only one who would've -- oh, I
dunno -- KEPT MY MOUTH SHUT IF I HAD A POOL OF NASTY-LOOKING FLUID HANGING OVER MY HEAD??
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DID YOU KNOW...,:
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Director John Carpenter was the genius
behind the horror classic HALLOWEEN.
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Jameson Parker starred as A.J. Simon
on the 80's series, "Simon and Simon".
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Producer Larry Franco worked as
2nd assistant director on Francis Coppola’s APOCALYPSE NOW.
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Dirk Blocker, who played Mullins in the
film, is the son of Dan Blocker, who portrayed Hoss Cartwright on TV's "Bonanza".
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