Revelation

Avoid this film at all costs. It has some of the poorest acting, direction and editing I have ever seen. And then there's the script. Oh dear. Having wasted 2 hours of my life with this nonsense I'll take 5 more minutes to warn any poor unsuspecting souls not to make the same mistake. It really is horrendous on every level. Film making at it's worst. Awful.

The film started with much promise, but is soon became obvious that either the script writer or the producer or both were out of their depth on the subject. Interesting story lines were made absurd by painfully obvious inconsistent and just plain wrong interpretations of the symbols and imagery. Disappointingly some of the imagery visible in the film at the locations where filming took place, could have been woven into the story to give it more body, but was instead given no more than backdrop status. This film is a lost opportunity; a little more research could have made it more coherent and provided a smooth flow rather than the disjointed feel it seemed to convey.

I'll start by admitting that `Revelation' had me completely fooled. It had so many elements of the mega best seller `The DaVinci Code' that I assumed it was a quick knockoff to capitalize on the popularity of the book. It certainly feels like it was thrown together far too quickly. But since the movie came out well before the book, I'll assume this is an original mess. It is instructive to see how it is possible to take exactly the same elements and arrange them into an enjoyable book, which frankly some people are taking way too seriously, or totally incoherent movie.

Actually there are a lot of decent elements here. In addition to interesting historical background, the acting, dialog, and production values are better than average for this genre.

But in the end all of this is wasted in a confusing and pointless plot. Nothing could recover from a story this bad.

Revelation had a wonderful air of intrigue, but left to much lacking in the process. In short it was choppy at best. If you did not pay attention during every minute of the film you would be lost the next minute. The movie as a whole was well played out, but lacking in the information department. There are even some moments where if you do not have a full understanding of the crucifixtion of Christ and the Templar knights you have no idea what anyone is talking about. The movie just ends as well, leaving an opening for sequels but will these sequels ever come to pass.??? My only major complaints are the widescreen aspect ratio on the DVD (extremely narrow) and also we needed a better explination on the grand master... he is just a evil guy sure, but without prior bible school classes you have little chance knowing he is more than likely poncius pilot's (forgive my spelling) commander of the guards who according to some biblical beliefs was sentenced by god to walk the earth till the end of time after stricking Jesus and being the man in charge of the crucifixtion. I would give it 2 1/2 stars out of 4

I rented this on DVD not knowing what it was about, or how good it was. Sometimes I walk away with a surprisingly good film, but not this time. (Maybe it was the image of Terence Stamp on the cover that assured me it couldn't be all bad.) The acting is weak with little or no emotion. You feel no empathy towards the characters who recite their lines like they were reading shopping list. Dead pauses in the script were seemingly immune to the editor's splices. Oh, I could go on, but it's easier to just say, "Miss this film at all costs!"