A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy 3: The Ascent

“They're making a THIRD Prophecy movie, is that correct Gabriel?”
“I can tell you in two words: UN. FORTUNATELY.”

Previously on A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy II...

A new prophecy came to pass, as it was a said a child would be born of angel and human that would united Heaven and Earth and end the Second Angel War, which is still going on despite Gabriel's death in the first movie. An angel named Danyael was chosen to knock up a nurse named Valerie Rosales so she could give birth to this child, which sure beats any job I've ever been chosen for.

The Devil kicked Gabriel out of hell because he was tired of being outcooled by him, the angel immediately getting to work to kill Valerie. Things didn't end very well for him, as he ended up getting transformed into a human by Michael, the angel leading the side against him. Valerie gave birth to a boy and they lived happily ever after.

Untilllllllllllllllllllll now. The Prophecy 3: The Ascent is another Direct To Video sequel, and they are really pushing their luck after pretty much striking gold with the first one. But they got Walken again, so how bad can it be right? Insert ominous tone here.  Hop in your car and look for a wall to run into as we begin A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy 3: The Ascent!

A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy II

"First, when there's nothing but a slow glowing dream
That your fear seems to hide deep inside your mind
All alone I have cried silent tears full of pride
In a world made of steel, made of stone
Well I hear the music, close my eyes, feel the rhythm
Wrap around, take a hold of my heart- WAIT NOT LIKE THAT!  AAAAAIIIIEEEEE!!!!!"

Previously on A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy...

The Archangel Gabriel led a revolt against Heaven, enraged that mankind was getting his love over that of the angels. The war was a stalemate until the angels discovered a soul on Earth so dark and powerful that whoever possessed it would win the war.

An angel named Simon found the soul first, but badly botched the plan to collect it. He ended up breaking Megan's Law and passing it to a little girl, who had to rely on a police detective and a school teacher to protect her.  They performed about as well as you'd expect two humans to do facing an omnipotent angel, so the Devil himself had to get involved to save the day and kill Gabriel. Yes, in a religious movie the Devil turned out to be the hero.  So how did the movie makers find a way to make a sequel to a story that had concluded? Let's find out in part two of the Prophecy saga, with A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy II!

A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy

"This review is 100% cowbell free."

Who doesn't love Christopher Walken? He has spent the last forty years entertaining us with his incredibly diverse acting ability with performances that'll be remembered as long as cinema exists. From hilarious to deadly serious to “what the hell am I watching?”, he can do it all. He even has the KILLER dance moves!

I've seen almost all of his movies and appearances with one glaring exception: I've never seen the Prophecy trilogy for some unexplainable reason. It's always been on my list of movies to check out, but years of procrastination combined with my untimely death just kept putting it off.  So last week when I was browsing eBay for potential movies to review, I happened to come across a Blu-Ray box set for dirt cheap and was very surprised to learn the trilogy had grown to a quintology.  I hit "Buy It Now" so fast I broke my keyboard and as of a few days ago I am now the proud owner of five Prophecy movies. Let's get this party started with A Ghoul Versus The Prophecy!

A Ghoul Versus Max Payne

“I don't believe in heaven, I believe in pain. I believe in fear. I believe in death.”

He also doesn't believe in telling a good story.  Max Payne the video game is freaking awesome. Released in 2001, it was the first truly great third person shooter to grace the video game world by combining razor sharp gameplay with a game changing innovation in bullet time, which allowed you to slow time down to better aim your shots. A common misconception is this was based on the insanely popular film the Matrix, but the game had actually been in development before the movie.

To top it off, they added a pretty deep and engrossing story. Some derided it for its overly angsty dialogue, but it was meant to be a tribute to classic hard boiled detective novels. Personally, I loved it and was quoting Max Payne for months after playing this game.  But Hollywood just can't let good video games rest in peace without mangling them into something completely unrecognizable from the source material, so we got Max Payne The Movie. It was directed by John Moore, whose only really notable film was 2001's Behind Enemy Lines. Oh, you forgot all about that one? Owen Wilson... in an action movie? Yeah.

The movie was written by Beau Thorne, and is the only thing I can find that he's ever written. After reading my review I think you'll see why he hasn't gotten work since this.  Pop some pain killers (you're going to need them) and get ready for A Ghoul Versus Max Payne! And yes, I'm going to annoyingly point out all the differences from the video game.

A Ghoul Versus Chronicle

“It's all fun and games until everybody gets hurt... and even then it's still kind of fun”

Chronicle is yet another movie I've never heard of until I saw a trailer for it a few weeks ago. It looked interesting enough as I'm a sucker for a “person gets super powers and starts going crazy” stories, so I bought it as the blu-ray is quite cheap. However, it turns out there's a Director's Cut version which is not the one I purchased, so this review is just for the theatrical edition.

This is the first “found footage” movie on this site, a genre which I am sick and tired of not because it's overdone, but because they almost never make sense from a realistic standpoint. No one would be able to capture most of the moments you see in the angles they get, and it constantly takes me out of the film. Not to mention issues like sound quality, battery life, memory limitations... yes, I overthink everything.

I suppose one could also point how most are woefully low budget and contain terrible writing, acting, directing, editing, and then there's the endings... oh Good God, the endings.  You know it says a lot about the state of today's movies when found footage film the Blair Witch Project is now considered the Citizen Kane of the genre.  But why am I ranting about horror found footage movies? We have a sci-fi one to watch! Let's see how this story fares, with A Ghoul Versus Chronicle.

A Ghoul Versus The Raid: Redemption

“Turn down for WHAT?!”

I had never heard of the Raid: Redemption before two weeks ago, probably because I was dead when it came out originally. Two weeks ago I was watching television and saw a trailer for a movie called the Raid 2, which looked like about the coolest thing ever.

I figured I better catch up on the rest of the series, so I went online to buy the Raid 1. I found the Raid: Redemption, but figured that must be a side story so I kept looking. But it turned out Redemption is the first movie, despite having a subtitle that indicates it wouldn't be.

The story behind this is the Raid is an Indonesian film released in 2011 under the title Serbuan Maut (the Raid). When it was picked up by Sony for an international release, they couldn't get the rights to the name “the Raid”, so they added the subtitle “Redemption”.

I know Hollywood is legally only allowed to use the subtitles Redemption, Revelations, Awakenings, Revenge, and Resurrection in their movies, so why choose that one? The Raid: Awakenings would have made so much more sense. But at least they're numbering the sequel, which is more than I can say about most damn movies these days.

Rant over, let's get a taste of Indonesian action with A Ghoul Versus The Raid: Redemption!

A Ghoul Versus World War Z

Click here for the a look into the troubled production of this movie!

We open with a black screen that says “Plan B”. I take this to mean “Plan A” has failed and we'll start off the movie knee deep in zomb- oh, turns out that was just a studio logo. They got me good!  The film opens with a montage of worldwide news reports. They start off innocent enough, but more and more start mentioning a virus. A virus? Oh boy, here we go again... another movie where the zombies aren't actually zombies but just INFECTED. Credits play to the side of the screen, Matthew Bellamy of Muse getting a music credit. Well, if this film turns out to be bad at least it'll have some good music.

We start with a house in Philadelphia, where Brad Pitt and his wife Karin get ambushed in bed by their two daughters who wake them up for breakfast. As they go about the day, we learn the older daughter (Rachel) has asthma.  You ever notice kids in these movies ALWAYS have to have a physical ailment that'll flare up at the most inopportune, but also most dramatic, moment?

A Ghoul Versus The History Of World War Z

World War Z is based on a book of the same name by Max Brooks, and when I based on I mean “they share the same title”. This is one of the most baffling and frustrating things Hollywood does, they spend millions of dollars to buy the rights to an established franchise and then use virtually NOTHING from said franchise.

This accomplishes in only alienating fans of the established franchise, who admittedly are NEVER the intended audience of the movie. So why go the trouble of jumping through all the legal hoops and spending tons of money that could have been better used elsewhere when you could have just as easily called your movie Nightgirl instead of Catwoman? Robot Uprising instead of I, Robot? Cyborg Avenger instead of the remake of Robocop? Gentleman Freedom Fighter instead of V For Vendetta? Yeah, we'll get to this one someday when I'm brave enough to take on the Wachowski body of work.

As said best by the author of the first two drafts of World War Z's screenplay, “If all you wanted to do was an empty-headed Rambo-versus-the-zombies action film, why option this really elegant, smart book?” In-freaking-deed.

A Ghoul Versus Disney's Frozen

Frozen is a BEAST. It came out in November 2013 and as of April 2014 is still in theaters. It's become the highest grossing animated film of all time, which puts it ninth on the all time list. The theme song “Let It Go” has slaughtered everything in its wake, winning about every music award imaginable. I'm also pretty sure 1 out of every 3 videos on YouTube is currently a “Let It Go” cover or parody. Look at how popular it is against the the YouTube Garbage All-Stars:

“Let It Go” 15.8 million results

Miley Cyrus 13.8 million results
Justin Bieber 13.7 million results
Katy Perry 9.4 million results
Gangnam Style 6.9 million results

As those numbers show, just because something is vastly popular doesn't mean it's even remotely good or worthy of praise. So does this film deserve its massive popularity? Let's find out with A Ghoul Versus Frozen.