| The Prophecy | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Gregory Widen Greg Spence Patrick Lussier Joel Soisson |
| Produced by | Bob Weinstein Harvey Weinstein Gregory Widen Robert Little Matt Greenberg Joel Soisson W.K. Border |
| Written by | Gregory Widen Matt Greenberg Greg Spence Carl V. Dupré Joel Soisson John Sullivan |
| Starring | Christopher Walken Elias Koteas Virginia Madsen Viggo Mortensen Jennifer Beals Brittany Murphy Eric Roberts Vincent Spano Kari Wuhrer John Light Sean Pertwee Doug Bradley Jason Scott Lee Tony Todd |
| Distributed by | Buena Vista Home Video Dimension Films |
| Release date(s) | 1995–2005 |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
The Prophecy is a fantasy horror-thriller film franchise which focuses on angels fighting each other to protect the survival of the human soul. Produced by Dimension Film, the series was established in 1995 with eponymous first installment,The Prophecy, which has since been followed by four sequels. In 2005, its latest sequel The Prophecy: Forsaken was released on DVD.
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The first of what became a series of films, The Prophecy was directed and written by Gregory Widen. The Archangel Gabriel (Christopher Walken) searches for an evil soul on Earth, while another angel named Simon (Eric Stoltz) warns Detective Thomas Dagget (Elias Koteas) of coming events, before disappearing. Gabriel’s second-in-command, Uziel (Jeff Cadiente), tracks Simon down and attempts to kill him, but Simon kills him instead.
Investigating the disturbance, Thomas goes to Simon's apartment and finds an obituary for a recently deceased Korean War veteran, Colonel Arnold Hawthorne, clipped from a newspaper in Chimney Rock, Arizona. More puzzling, Thomas finds a copy of a theology text that he himself wrote years ago. In Chimney Rock, Simon, who is badly wounded after his fight with Uziel, finds the veteran and removes the soul from the body, and in his desperation to hide, he passes it on to a small schoolgirl, Mary (Moriah Shining Dove Snyder) who he befriends. Mary immediately falls ill, and is cared for by her teacher, Katherine (Virginia Madsen).
Gabriel later finds Simon and kills him by ripping his heart out, after discovering that he does not have the soul. The police detective and the teacher unknowingly become caught in the middle of an angelic war. As the film progresses, Katherine is confronted by Lucifer (Viggo Mortensen), who tells her that since the creation of man, no soul has been allowed to enter Heaven due to the war waged by Gabriel. He knows that if Gabriel wins, Heaven will ultimately devolve into another Hell, and that doesn't sit well with him because it is "one Hell too many". The next day, Lucifer appears to Thomas, telling him about the nature of Hell, and then advises him to use Gabriel's lack of faith as a weapon against him. When Gabriel arrives, Thomas questions him about his true motives for starting the war. Gabriel reveals that God no longer speaks to him. The angel attempts to disrupt the Native American ritual, but is stopped by Thomas, who runs over Gabriel with a truck, then beats him with a tire iron.
As the ritual continues, Lucifer appears and approaches Gabriel. He tells him the war is based on arrogance, which is evil, making it Lucifer's territory. Lucifer rips out Gabriel's heart while Hawthorne's soul is expelled from Mary and destroyed, seemingly by God. Lucifer consumes Gabriel's heart, and with blood dripping off his mouth, he asks Thomas and Katherine to "come home" with him, but they refuse. The film ends with Thomas commenting on the nature of faith and what it means to be human.
The Prophecy II directed by Greg Spence, written by Matt Greenberg and Greg Spence. Gabriel (reprised by Christopher Walken) returns from hell to Earth to prevent the birth of a child, a nephilim, the offspring of one of his kind and one of God's "monkeys" (i.e., humans). The coming of this child, said to precede reconciliation between the warring factions in heaven, has been prophesied by a monk, Thomas Daggett (Bruce Abbott) —the former detective from the first film in the series. The child's conception takes place when Valerie (Jennifer Beals), a nurse, is seduced by an attractive stranger, the angel Danyael (Russell Wong), who she hit with her car. She finds a few days later that she is in advanced pregnancy.
Gabriel attempts to find the whereabouts of the child from Daggett, but kills him when he refuses to help. When Danyael kills members of Gabriel's army of angels, Gabriel instead employs the assistance of a teenage girl, Izzy (Brittany Murphy), who has just committed suicide. Gabriel keeps her alive to help him in his search for Valerie because despite his powers as an angel, he is completely naive about technology, and is unable to drive a car or work a computer and has her use her computer skills to find her and drive him around.
Gabriel's war against Danyael and the other angels climaxes in a battle in Eden, now an industrial wasteland. Danyael is killed, but Valerie defeats Gabriel by seizing him and jumping from a building, confident that God will protect her as He told her He would (she reveals that Gabriel is unable to hear His voice as he simply doesn't listen); she is indeed unharmed, but Gabriel is impaled on a spike. As punishment, Gabriel is turned into a human by Archangel Michael (Eric Roberts). Valerie raises the child by herself, accepting the risk that the angels may come for her. The film ends with Gabriel as a derelict; a face in the sky and ominous clouds show that the war in heaven is not over.
The Prophecy 3: The Ascent directed by Patrick Lussier, written by Carl Dupré and Joel Soisson. Danyael Rosales (Dave Buzzotta), a street preacher and the child of Valerie Rosales and the angel Danyael from the previous film, is forced to face his destiny. As a Nephilim, he has some of the angels' abilities, such as regeneration, and can only be killed if his heart is removed. One night, a blind assassin shoots Danyael as he preaches before a crowd, but the assassin is driven off before he can take out Danyael's heart, and Danyael is able to regenerate while lying in the city morgue. As punishment for his failure, angel Zophael (Vincent Spano) kills the assassin and starts going after Danyael himself with an extendable bladed weapon (the blade can be turned into a three-pronged hook) with which he plans to use to remove Danyael's heart, killing him for good. However, Danyael is protected by Gabriel (reprised by Christopher Walken), a now-human fallen angel who killed Danyael's father and performed many misdeeds. After being defeated by Danyael's mother, Gabriel was turned into a human as punishment. He has spent eighteen years as a human, and realized how wrong he was in the past so has now switched sides.
Zophael manages to convince Danyael's girlfriend Maggie (Kayren Butler) to work with him on killing Danyael, but she realizes she's on the wrong side and tries to shoot the angel. It has little effect on Zophael, and he tells her what he is. Frightened, Maggie agrees to help him, and the two catch up to Danyael on a Native American reservation, where he is going to confront Pyriel (Scott Cleverdon), another angel who wants to overthrow God. Danyael briefly meets Mary, a Native American woman (first introduced as a child in the first film). Mary informs Danyael that she dreamed of his coming, and that she believes he will be victorious against Pyriel. After parting from Mary, Danyael is attacked by Zophael, crashing Maggie's truck and badly injuring her. He then faces off against Danyael in battle, and seemingly defeats him by impaling his chest with a motorcycle tailpipe, but the angel gets back up and uses his weapon to impale Danyael from behind. Before Zophael can remove Danyael's heart, Maggie empties her gun into him, stunning him. Danyael takes his chance and removes Zophael's heart through the hole he created earlier, finally killing him.
Danyael heads off to face Pyriel, armed with Zophael's weapon while Gabriel watches over Maggie. He confronts Pyriel, but is no match for him, although he succeeds in impaling him with Zophael's weapon. Pyriel is about to win when God seemingly sends down a lightning bolt, electrocuting the weapon and, through it, Pyriel, weakening him. Danyael extends the blade into its prong form and removes Pyriel's heart with it, killing him and apparently ending the war in Heaven. He returns to Gabriel and Maggie, who is on the verge of death. Maggie is saved when Gabriel is given a second chance and becomes an angel again; he heals her wounds on his way back to Heaven.
The Prophecy: Uprising directed by Joel Soisson and written by John Sullivan. The movie begins with the story of a woman named Allison (Kari Wührer) who has come into possession of The Lexicon, a mysterious book of prophecies that writes itself. This book contains a 23rd chapter of the Bible, which is still not complete. The last chapter depicts the end of the war of angels. One of the angels who fell with Satan, Belial (Doug Bradley), now a demon wants this book.
While searching for Allison and the book, and to avoid detection, Belial keeps on murdering people and taking their form. Meanwhile, Lucifer (John Light) seeks the help of a cop, Dani Simionescu (Sean Pertwee), who has a dark secret; as a child he reported his parents to secret police, and then they were brought to police headquarters to be tortured in front of him and his baby sister. Afterward, his baby sister gets hurt and then given up for adoption who is Allison. Satan brings the cop to the same house which witnessed inhumane tortures, making it his domain. Allison, with guidance of the voices in her head, reaches the same place, followed by Belial. It is the only place where Belial cannot hurt Allison. It is a place of evil, which makes it Satan area and he offered Allision and her brother protection. Here, the cop confesses for his sins and seeks forgiveness but is rebucked by his sister. It is here that real motives are revealed. Belial who was loyal to Satan now wants to get some advantage from war of angels. He is frustated by the inertness of Satan and now wants an aggressive hell. Satan, who had initially opposed God for his love for humans, helps humans to fight Belial. He does not want another hell. As per him, only one hell is enough for the world. He helps the cop and Allison to kill Belial and then he absorbs Belial's soul. The movie concludes at the dawn, when Satan tells Allison that for the present the war of angels is over, but will not be for long. Showing her glimpses of her future advises her to keep the book safe.
The Prophecy: Forsaken directed by Joel Soisson, written by John Sullivan. Following the events of the previous film, Allison (reprised by Kari Wührer) is still protecting the Lexicon, an ancient book that will foretell the name of the coming Antichrist, from renegade angels called Thrones who are led by a sinister character called Stark (Tony Todd). Allison is assisted by Dylan (Jason Scott Lee), a contract killer, who was actually hired to kill Allison but after an epiphany decides to help her instead. She also seeks help from Lucifer (reprised by John Light) who explains that the Lexicon is going to name the anti-Christ in a matter of hours.
The angels later capture Allison and bring her before Stark; he tells her that he is against the whole messy idea of Armageddon. If they can find the name of the anti-Christ, they can kill the child before apocalypse and save humanity. Allison claims she is not keen on the idea of going over God's head, and she does not think he is either or she'd already be dead. Stark promises to kill her if he has to; however, he lets her leave for now. As Allison leaves, she runs into Lucifer in the park; he helps her reason through what has happen. Stark and a few of the other seraphim aren't happy with the idea of Armageddon. After all, it means Heaven will be flooded with humans, beloved by God above even the seraphim themselves. Of course, Lucifer likes the idea of Armageddon because it will mean that a billion new corrupt souls will appear on his doorstep.
Allison then runs to the abandoned house that contains the Lexicon and climbs the stairs to the top of the building as Stark is in hot pursuit; meantime, the Lexicon produces the name of the anti Christ—Mykael Paun, and he shall bear four distinct marks on his face. Stark corners her on the roof and claims that the child is there in Bucharest. He then asks her if she wonders why she was chosen and how she's been able to keep the Lexicon from creatures more powerful than her. He states that she is a "nephalim," a half-breed between an angel named "Simon" (a character from the first film). and a human, bred specifically to protect the Lexicon therefore Allison is nothing more than a tool. Dylan than shoots Allison repeatedly in the chest, nevertheless, there was a method in his madness; as Allison falls over the precipice, the pages of the Lexicon scatter everywhere. The winds carry them throughout the streets of Bucharest, and Allison survives due to her "nephalim" healing powers. Now, Stark has no way of tracking them all down. The final page, the one Stark was looking for, falls at the feet of a young boy—a young boy named Mykael Paun.
The Prophecy: Uprising and The Prophecy: Forsaken were filmed simultaneously.[1] Furthermore, these films are the first of the series to not have Christopher Walken and Steve Hytner reprise their roles as the Archangel Gabriel and the coroner Joseph, respectively.
The first film of the series,The Prophecy, received mostly positive reviews: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette claimed that the film was “Chilling!” New York Post glorifies the film for its “Top –Notch Cast!” Chicago Tribune professes the film as “Entertaining!”
In 1998, The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror films rated the film's first sequel, The Prophecy II, as “The Year’s Most Suspenseful Thriller” and Cinefantastique praises the film for being “Intense…Action Packed! Walken Steals the Show!”
Several of the The Prophecy sequel films have been released direct-to-DVD.
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