seals_jay
A rejoint juin 2004
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Commentaires5
Évaluation de seals_jay
This movie, as stated in another review, is based on the supposition that Satan is a singular, sentient and real entity. That, in and of itself, is a critical and crucial point. If you don't subscribe to that belief, the whole premise will seem practically pointless to you.
I won't go into the points made by others that this film is a propaganda piece that leans towards supporting Christianity. You'd have to view the film with your own eyes, experience it for yourself to make that judgment. I'll attempt to critique the film on its own merits, as a film, and not stray into the realm of ideology.
As a piece of work, I can't say that I enjoyed the production quality of the film. The cinematography is of a quality that is lower than you'd see in a present-day made-for-TV movie. Honestly, the production value was something I'd expect from the late eighties or perhaps the early nineties. Poor editing, bad scene transitions, shoddy audio, unimpressive lighting and inadequate stage direction all conspired to make the presentation of the film less than engaging. The sound track alone was a poor mix of Christian-oriented "pop" and instrumentals that sounded like they were done on a synthesizer- and the musical compositions lacked feeling, dynamism or flow, like something that had been produced by a first-year college student who took himself way too seriously as a composer. Lots of minor chords that were intended to sound "moody" and "dramatic" but ended up coming off as campy and discordant.
The acting was incredibly sub-par. I've done stage acting before and saw better work out of high school students. Everyone who had a role hammed it up when they were in front of the camera, even Mr. McDowell (who, make no mistake, is an actor that I respect and like, for the most part). It seemed like everyone started out taking their roles seriously, but somehow lost heart and just went through the motions in an effort to just be done with the job. Satan's legal team, most especially Mr. InYourFace, were over-the-top and practically comical in the delivery of their lines. McDowell, by and large, did a lot of sneering and did his best to look brooding/menacing, but I didn't really get the impression that he cared about his role or identified with it in any way. No one showed much in the motivation for their characters. And the protagonist, Luke O'Brien, couldn't seem to make up his mind- was he a lawyer or a victim? I couldn't tell and he never really seemed to, either. Part of this, I feel, was a failure of the part of the actors, BUT an actor can do only so much with what they've been given.
The writing... oh, dear God, the writing! A good, solid story idea was positively *destroyed* by some of the most hackneyed dialog I've seen in years. The only genre I know of where the dialog MIGHT be as bad is in porn. I watched the court proceedings and found myself absolutely mystified at most of the arguments put forth on both sides of the bar. It was like the writer had started out with a fairly decent direction on a single point and then, somehow, lost it entirely and never quite took the thought to its logical conclusion. The accusations fired at both the defense and the plaintiff went absolutely *nowhere* and left me scratching my head, wondering who exactly won that round, if anyone. There was no sense of cohesion anywhere and all I got out of it was a hodge-podge of disassociated claims without any substantive argument. It was, in short, an utter mess of a script.
I applaud the IDEA behind making the film. It's not a bad one, really. But it was painfully, poorly executed in almost every way. As an entertainment device to further the Christian agenda, I truly believe that this piece of work didn't rise to the occasion. It didn't even rise to the bait. The whole thing could have been done better. I could have forgiven the bad music, the poor production quality and lack-luster editing, but the dialog and its delivery (by *everyone!*) is what killed it for me in the end.
I wouldn't inflict this on good, God-loving people unless I was absolutely certain that they were mindless sheep who couldn't think for themselves. If you fit that category of sub-human, you're more than welcome to further damaging your brain cells by watching this... film.
I won't go into the points made by others that this film is a propaganda piece that leans towards supporting Christianity. You'd have to view the film with your own eyes, experience it for yourself to make that judgment. I'll attempt to critique the film on its own merits, as a film, and not stray into the realm of ideology.
As a piece of work, I can't say that I enjoyed the production quality of the film. The cinematography is of a quality that is lower than you'd see in a present-day made-for-TV movie. Honestly, the production value was something I'd expect from the late eighties or perhaps the early nineties. Poor editing, bad scene transitions, shoddy audio, unimpressive lighting and inadequate stage direction all conspired to make the presentation of the film less than engaging. The sound track alone was a poor mix of Christian-oriented "pop" and instrumentals that sounded like they were done on a synthesizer- and the musical compositions lacked feeling, dynamism or flow, like something that had been produced by a first-year college student who took himself way too seriously as a composer. Lots of minor chords that were intended to sound "moody" and "dramatic" but ended up coming off as campy and discordant.
The acting was incredibly sub-par. I've done stage acting before and saw better work out of high school students. Everyone who had a role hammed it up when they were in front of the camera, even Mr. McDowell (who, make no mistake, is an actor that I respect and like, for the most part). It seemed like everyone started out taking their roles seriously, but somehow lost heart and just went through the motions in an effort to just be done with the job. Satan's legal team, most especially Mr. InYourFace, were over-the-top and practically comical in the delivery of their lines. McDowell, by and large, did a lot of sneering and did his best to look brooding/menacing, but I didn't really get the impression that he cared about his role or identified with it in any way. No one showed much in the motivation for their characters. And the protagonist, Luke O'Brien, couldn't seem to make up his mind- was he a lawyer or a victim? I couldn't tell and he never really seemed to, either. Part of this, I feel, was a failure of the part of the actors, BUT an actor can do only so much with what they've been given.
The writing... oh, dear God, the writing! A good, solid story idea was positively *destroyed* by some of the most hackneyed dialog I've seen in years. The only genre I know of where the dialog MIGHT be as bad is in porn. I watched the court proceedings and found myself absolutely mystified at most of the arguments put forth on both sides of the bar. It was like the writer had started out with a fairly decent direction on a single point and then, somehow, lost it entirely and never quite took the thought to its logical conclusion. The accusations fired at both the defense and the plaintiff went absolutely *nowhere* and left me scratching my head, wondering who exactly won that round, if anyone. There was no sense of cohesion anywhere and all I got out of it was a hodge-podge of disassociated claims without any substantive argument. It was, in short, an utter mess of a script.
I applaud the IDEA behind making the film. It's not a bad one, really. But it was painfully, poorly executed in almost every way. As an entertainment device to further the Christian agenda, I truly believe that this piece of work didn't rise to the occasion. It didn't even rise to the bait. The whole thing could have been done better. I could have forgiven the bad music, the poor production quality and lack-luster editing, but the dialog and its delivery (by *everyone!*) is what killed it for me in the end.
I wouldn't inflict this on good, God-loving people unless I was absolutely certain that they were mindless sheep who couldn't think for themselves. If you fit that category of sub-human, you're more than welcome to further damaging your brain cells by watching this... film.