A Revelação

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!"

Director/writer Stuart (PREACHING TO THE PERVERTED) Urban's portentous contemporary religious conspiracy thriller marks a return to feature film production for Britain's Romulus Films (THE AFRICAN QUEEN, OLIVER!, THE DAY OF THE JACKAL) for the first time since 1974's THE ODESSA FILE. The story concerns a young couple (he Jake, the computer hacker ex-con son of an enigmatic billionaire akin to Rupert Murdoch, she Mira, a brainy alchemist) searching for a religious relic ('a loculus') purported to possess mythical powers. This sends them spinning around Europe and Asia following alcehmical, astrological and religious clues, all the while stalked by Udo Kier's supremely villainous 'Grand Master' as Urban stirs all these ingredients into a heady brew, cutting back and forth in time and place with no lack of visual style, finally bringing them to the boil in an apocalyptic climax with implications for the future of mankind. Unfortunately the film, ambitious in scope and breadth, has a reach which exceeds its grasp; especially as it ultimately seems to pay off as a two-hour recruitment film for the Catholic church. Dull leads don't help, although there's sterling support from the enigmatic Terence Stamp as Jake's father, Celia Imrie as Mum, Derek Jacobi as a weaselly University librarian and Ron Moody as Sir Isaac Newton (yes, really). Good to see an independent British film aiming high, but difficult to imagine who'll pay to see this generic mishmash (it lacks sufficient impressive horror or action setpieces for a start). After all, if Demi Moore in THE SEVENTH SIGN and Johnny Depp in THE NINTH GATE couldn't bring in the punters, what hope does this similarly themed and thoughtful, if highly-flawed, fantasy have? File under 'Interesting Failure'.

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.

I was baised towards this film as I know someone in it. I feel so sorry for the producer as he must have had great visions for this film, as did I. There are some shocking moments that leave you wide eyed and disbelieving what you have just seen, but it seems like a decent film spoiled by some terrible acting.

The last line that Jacob says.... had us rolling around in laughter from its pure cheeseyness.

How did such a good story line get made into such a Straight-to-TV quality film?

Could have been so good. Ended up as disappointing.

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.