Main cast: John Light (John Riegert), Sean Pertwee (Dani Simionescu), Kari Wuhrer (Allison), Jason London (Simon), Doug Bradley (Laurel), Georgina Rylance (Calra), Stephen Billington (Ion), Dan Chiriac (Serban), Boris Petroff (Father Constantin), Alin Cristea (Cantor), and Dan Astileanu (Hardy)
Director: Joel Soisson
There are some movies that, despite the obvious low budget and some huge problems in the story, really appeal to me to the point that I love them to pieces when other people will think me crazy for doing so. The Prophecy: Uprising is one such movie. This movie appeals to me in every way that counts: I adore the chemistry between the two male lead characters, I love the canon of the story, and I love the unexpected moments of irony and humor in this movie.
Despite being the fourth movie in the The Prophecy franchise, this one is barely connected to the trilogy featuring Christopher Walken and is best treated as a brand new movie instead of one related to the trilogy, or else you may never get over the retcon of the canon and the absence of Christopher Walken’s Archangel Gabriel. Then again, I think John Light did a pretty good job filling in as Lucifer – much better, in my opinion, that Viggo Mortensen did in the original movie.
This time around, we are in Budapest, Hungary, where we meet Dani Simionescu, a cop with dark secrets. He is doing his thing, beating up criminals and stealing their money, when he pretty much stumbles upon a case where dead bodies show up with their hearts ripped out of their chest. One of these dead bodies turns out to be a drug dealer whom he had just roughed up and stolen his money – which is to say, Dani is the last person to see this fellow alive, not that he is, of course, telling anyone. He gets an unwanted partner – Interpol agent John Riegert.
Meanwhile, elsewhere, a young orphan named Allison centers her life around the church. She stumbles upon Father Constantin who seemed to have died of a heart attack while reading an old book. Lo, a being who calls himself the angel Simon shows up to tell her to take the book and run away with it as bad guys are looking for that book. The book, called the Lexicon, is a Bible that, unlike other Bibles, is still being dictated by God. Which is to say, the Lexicon is still unfinished – writing magically appears on the last unwritten page as time goes by. Anyone who owns the Lexicon, therefore, will be the first to know what God wants people to know. Therefore, this book must be kept out of the claws of the fallen angel Belial who is right now on a rampage to recover the Lexicon.
I don’t believe I will be spoiling the story one bit since it’s pretty clear in the first few moments of the movie that John Riegert is not human and every review and product information of this movie since 2005 mentions it, so I may as well mention it here too: John is the Devil himself. This makes the movie pretty amusing in a way, as we have the Devil trying to stop his rogue lieutenant from getting his hands on the Lexicon and causing another war to erupt between the angels and the devils. Dani is merely a pawn in the big picture while Allison is merely an instrument as the Devil, the angel Simon, and other bigger forces at play move the pawn pieces across the chessboard, so to speak, for a simple yet dramatic climax.
Kari Wuhrer’s portrayal of Allison is pretty apt as her Allison is a right balance of quiet unexpected strength and vulnerabilities. But the stars of the show, to me, are Sean Pertwee and John Light as their characters’ dynamics and interplay make this show a pure delight to savor. John Reigert at times is wry and sarcastic, a nice foil to Dani’s more arrogant blusters and temper tantrums, but as the movie progresses, it becomes very clear that John, as the Devil, is capable of inhuman acts that leave Dani shaken to the core. But at the same time, John is, as he puts it, at that moment the lesser of the two evils at work so Dani has best stick by him if he wants to see the world saved. I think Dani even likes that fellow, heh. There is a pretty cute moment when Dani makes John promise that one day Dani will see John in his true form and John, with a sly and knowing smile, says that oh yes, he’ll be more than happy to promise Dani that.
Dani and John have a very intriguing chemistry. I won’t say that these two have a homoerotic thing going, although there are moments when I want to tell these two to just kiss already, heh. They have more of an unexpected buddy thing going in this movie, and I love how John easily flusters poor Dani until that fellow doesn’t know which way is up anymore. Both characters are perfect examples of antiheroes: John is, after all, the Devil while Dani’s secret makes him an all but completely unforgivable character. I love how the movie puts these two as the saviors of the universe and makes them such deliciously compelling characters to boot.
There are weak and even illogical moments in the story, especially during Dani’s confrontation with Belial, but I love the movie way too much on the whole. I hate to say this, but I think I’m somewhat in love with the Devil in this movie, heh. John Light’s brooding face and dry deadpan delivery of his lines are just perfect here. The Prophecy: Uprising is one of those movies I never expected to love but love it to pieces I do even when a part of me believes that this movie has some serious problems in the storyline. I blame this on the Devil.
