Soulkeeper

This is a very entertaining film which I only discovered through the now essenjtial combination of eBay and the IMDB.

The two leads, who remind me of a young John Ritter and a young Patrick Swayze, are likeable. They master that difficult trick of showing spiritual development whilst being funny. Their confessions are delightful: "I once owned a copy of Judas Priest's Unleashed in the East".

There'a great cast of support players including Brad Dourif, Robert Davi and Karen Black.

The direction is very smart, with plenty of good tricks. I liked the snaring of the heroes in their first assault on Simon Magus's mansion.

Simon Magus! That's a nice piece of Christian lore to firm up the story's background.

The plotting is neat with some of the less understandable interludes made clear at the film's resolution which had a surprisingly wistful quality.

For a low brow, low budget horror film this one is actually better than usual. Some of the jokes are actually amusing, the performers are lively and the special effects are actually quite good. Not all the bits are successful - but how can you go wrong with Karen Black as a fortune teller/psychic/manicurist who projectile vomits all over co-star Rowland while levitating during a 'seance'. The cast is rounded out by Robert Davi, Brad Dourif, Tiny Lister and Deborah Gibson appearing ever-so-briefly as herself!

I believe, after watching this, not only in 'the power of the human soul,' but in the capacity for man to inflict evil upon fellow man. 'Soulkeeper,' and let's not kid ourselves here, isn't great. I would say that it fits in more with the 'cringe-worthily unfortunate' category. It aims to be a comedy-action-horror and really isn't very good at any of them. The comedy routine that runs throughout the film is a collection of one-liners that mostly don't fire. Mostly they tend to be funny in spite of themselves rather than because they actually are. The horror had potential (despite the ludicrous monster on the cover of the box) but is wounded by a serious failure on the part of the film-writers to establish any tension or threat that the two heroes might be in danger (well, at least until the climactic battle scene at the end). 'Soulkeeper' was like watching a long episode of Scooby-doo without any of the charm. Yeah there is a monster, but do you really think the two clowning knuckleheads in this buddy film gone wrong are in serious trouble? If one of the two leads had broken out the scooby snacks when the going got tough (wait, it never got tough ... except for me) we would have been alright.

To be fair it has its moments. The "comedy" is grating because it tries too hard but there are times when you can't tell if it is being unintentionally funny or if there is great wit and a satirical mindset at work. Watching with friends was the only right decision I made about this movie because at least we could operate like a support group for trauma survivors. My favorite observation came when the two protagonists were in a cemetery and trapped in a night terror of sorts. The Robert Davi character snaps them out of it by hitting them with not one, but two buckets of water. My friend, bless him, wondered where he got the first, let alone second bucket of water? Genius or madness?!? YOU decide! hah hah hah!! ...late for therapy...

(2001) Soulkeeper COMEDY HORROR

Although, the actual VHS case has a cool 3D cover on it, it's still a mediocre effort which is reminiscent of "Highway to Hell" made in 1991 because of it's laid back approach on the horror genre. Straight-to-rental but contains some familiar scenes to other films like "The Mummy" movies with Brendon Fraser and "From Dusk Til' Dawn". Written and directed by Darin Ferriola starring Rodney Rowland as Corey and Kevin Patrick Walls as Terrence, lightweight and sometimes clumsy thieves who're working together. They've just stolen a hat from some small museum that was supposed to be worn by Abe Lincoln and made some money out of it. They're then somehow get hired by a person who calls himself Mr. Pascal played by Brad Dourif, you know the guy who played Grima Wormtongue, the greasy snake guy from "The Lord Of The Ring" movies. Anyways, Mr. Pascal hires them to confiscate and steal some emblems as well as performing other tasks with reasons unbeknownst to viewers but has something to do with the reincarnation of a demon which has killed some ritualistic believers in the first few minutes, and also has the ability to possess other peoples human forms. Labelled as a light weight horror extravaganza which I think I only chuckled at least once throughout my entire experience since much of it is meandering. It has something do with the two stars entering what looked like the devil's brothel, unaware that the girls are really demons. I think the uncut TV version is slightly different than the VHS version for I'm not really sure since it was awhile ago since I had seen this.

I rented this movie cause I heard it wasn't bad and I gotta tell ya, it wasn't bad... it was surprisingly good! Alright, so it is kinda low budget (although the special effects looked on par with most studio flicks) but the acting, direction, suspense, monsters were convincing and intriguing enough to keep me more entertained than most stuff in theaters. It's a silly movie, but if you like throwback flicks that combine horror and comedy (like Fright Night and Evil Dead) this is right up your alley.