Prince of Darkness (1987)

Tagline: Where are you...? Christ?

Curiosity: I’m a big John Carpenter fan, at least where his ’80s work is considered.

Plot: A priest (Carpenter regular Donald Pleasance) invites a research team led by Professor Howard Birack (Victor Wong, another regular) to evaluate a mysterious canister found in an abandoned Los Angeles church. See, it contains a swirling green liquid that just might be sentient. And the Anti-Christ. The team translates an old text found with the canister and performs experiments on the liquid. That doesn’t go so well, as the liquid begins possessing the scientists one by one. Unable to escape, as the building is surrounded by a group of homicidal hobos (led by Alice Cooper!), the group has no choice but to surge ahead.

Thoughts: Allegedly the second installment of writer/director/composer Carpenter’s “Apocalypse Trilogy” that began with the fair superior The Thing, Prince of Darkness takes what was so great about the that film (Who can we trust? We’re all alone! How powerful are the aliens?) and waters it down. Distance and elemental forces cut off the characters in The Thing; in Prince of Darkness, it’s more a matter of not knowing when to walk around the city (I recommend during the day). While Carpenter approaches the story with some interesting ideas (God and Satan, or “Anti-God,” are aliens, we need to save the future, etc.), the story gets too bogged down in faux-science, while the film’s ultimate climax – a battle of wills and wits with the Anti-Christ – doesn’t really go anywhere. Creepier still is the way the Anti-Christ possesses people – via bukake:

And while Carpenter has written some rememorizing scores (Halloween’s theme is a classic), his keyboard cuts here are so simple and lame that they border on ridiculous.

Still, it’s fun to play “spot the friend.” Carpenter loved bringing back actors from previous films – there’s Dennis Dun from Big Trouble in Little China, and Peter Jason from They Live. And the make-up for the Anti-Christ is pretty dang creepy.

Reflection: I might have enjoyed this more if I hadn’t just watched the super awesome Paranormal Activity.