Priest (D or 1/4 stars)
'Priest' (directed by Scott Charles Stewart ... nice names) offered me a unique movie experience. I saw it a few days ago, & I sit down now to write this review ... and I can't, for the life of me, remember what it was all about. THAT is the impression it left me. The setting for this tale is a post-apocalyptic future/alternate world. After centuries of war btwn. vampires & men, the Church assigns warrior-priests to slay the vampires. The survivors are kept in reserves & hives & the humans live in dystopian-like cities ruled by the almighty Catholic Church. The priests are outcast by the Church, terrified of the power of their fighting skills.
When Owen Pace (Stephen Moyer) & Shannon, who live in an outpost, are slaughtered by a band of vampires & their daughter Lucy (Lily Collins) is abducted from a crawl space by said vampires ... local trigger-happy Sheriff Hicks (Cam Gigandet) searches for Owen's recluse brother, the legendary warrior-'Priest' (Paul Bettany), to help find Lucy. The Priest asks permission to search from Monsignor Orelas (Christopher Plummer), but he denies. So the Priest disobeys church law, breaks his own sacred vows, & travels with Hicks to hunt down the vampires & rescue his niece Lucy before they turn her into one, as well. With time, an otherworldly warrior Priestess (Maggie Q) joins the Priest & Hicks (who happens to be Lucy's boyfriend) in their quest to vanquish & rescue.
'Priest' may be based on a series of Korean comics, but for me ... it's mostly based on a host of other similar movies. Right off the bat, the 1st scene is almost a duplicate of a horror scene from Sleepy Hollow - where the parents send their child to hide under the floorboards when a menace approaches their log cabin {couldn't believe my eyes}. Later, the spaces that the human survivors live in resemble those from Blade Runner. The hives that survivors stay in reminded me of Surrogates. The outcasts who live in the post-apocalyptic landscapes reminded me of Mad Max, The Road, & The Book of Eli.
Whenever there's action sequences, the slick-costumed characters move in slo-mo martial arts, a la The Matrix. Paul Bettany's look reminded me of his work in The Da Vinci Code & the extremely similar Legion. There are 'quest' scenes that felt straight out of Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Maggie Q's character seemed like something straight out of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon or Hero.
I could go on. THAT is how unoriginal this movie is. The plot is as thin as paper; & offers nothing interesting as a sci-fi/Western/vampire mash-up. The characters are cardboard; even with valiant attempts by Bettany, Cam Gigandet, & the like, to make their characters fleshed out. It just doesn't happen for them. Bettany can glare, snort & frown all he wants. I just wasn't feelin' the same anger/determination/fear that he did. 'Priest' also lacks a spark. I. simply. don't. remember. this. movie. The film also has a video-game look. i.e., the hokey cowboy-gothic costumes, the de-saturated colors, the iffy CGI, the blurry action set pieces, the icy cold characters, etc.. There's just very little rooting interest with anyone or anything in this movie. Blech.
When Owen Pace (Stephen Moyer) & Shannon, who live in an outpost, are slaughtered by a band of vampires & their daughter Lucy (Lily Collins) is abducted from a crawl space by said vampires ... local trigger-happy Sheriff Hicks (Cam Gigandet) searches for Owen's recluse brother, the legendary warrior-'Priest' (Paul Bettany), to help find Lucy. The Priest asks permission to search from Monsignor Orelas (Christopher Plummer), but he denies. So the Priest disobeys church law, breaks his own sacred vows, & travels with Hicks to hunt down the vampires & rescue his niece Lucy before they turn her into one, as well. With time, an otherworldly warrior Priestess (Maggie Q) joins the Priest & Hicks (who happens to be Lucy's boyfriend) in their quest to vanquish & rescue.
'Priest' may be based on a series of Korean comics, but for me ... it's mostly based on a host of other similar movies. Right off the bat, the 1st scene is almost a duplicate of a horror scene from Sleepy Hollow - where the parents send their child to hide under the floorboards when a menace approaches their log cabin {couldn't believe my eyes}. Later, the spaces that the human survivors live in resemble those from Blade Runner. The hives that survivors stay in reminded me of Surrogates. The outcasts who live in the post-apocalyptic landscapes reminded me of Mad Max, The Road, & The Book of Eli.
Whenever there's action sequences, the slick-costumed characters move in slo-mo martial arts, a la The Matrix. Paul Bettany's look reminded me of his work in The Da Vinci Code & the extremely similar Legion. There are 'quest' scenes that felt straight out of Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Maggie Q's character seemed like something straight out of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon or Hero.
I could go on. THAT is how unoriginal this movie is. The plot is as thin as paper; & offers nothing interesting as a sci-fi/Western/vampire mash-up. The characters are cardboard; even with valiant attempts by Bettany, Cam Gigandet, & the like, to make their characters fleshed out. It just doesn't happen for them. Bettany can glare, snort & frown all he wants. I just wasn't feelin' the same anger/determination/fear that he did. 'Priest' also lacks a spark. I. simply. don't. remember. this. movie. The film also has a video-game look. i.e., the hokey cowboy-gothic costumes, the de-saturated colors, the iffy CGI, the blurry action set pieces, the icy cold characters, etc.. There's just very little rooting interest with anyone or anything in this movie. Blech.