End of Days (1999) Arnold Schwarzenegger, Gabriel Byrne, Kevin Pollak, Robin Tunney, Rod Steiger, CCH Pounder, Miriam Margolyes. Screenplay by Andrew W. Marlowe. Directed by Peter Hyams. 118 minutes. Rated R, 1 star (out of five stars)
Review by Ed Johnson-Ott, NUVO Newsweekly www.nuvo-online.com Archive reviews at http://us.imdb.com/ReviewsBy?Edward+Johnson-Ott
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Hollywood never fails to astound me. Every time I think those coked-up little buggers have hit rock bottom; they come up with a new excavating tool. I was truly convinced that "Wild Wild West" marked 1999 studio filmmaking at its most hapless, but then along comes "End of Days" to prove me wrong. This big budget, brain dead apocalyptic thriller bludgeons its audience with overwrought music, grisly violence, explosions galore and lots of cheesy special effects. The result? Nothing but groans and yawns. Even the Devil himself is unable to produce a decent scare in this festival of the inept. At the very least, "End of Days" should have done us the courtesy of being bad-enough-to-be-good, but it can't even manage that. It's just lousy.
Arnold Schwarzenegger, still recovering from heart problems and "Batman & Robin," plays an ex-cop turned security agent or bodyguard or something. Along with his obligatory comic relief partner (Kevin Pollak, impersonating Matthew Perry's Chandler character from "Friends"), he gets involved in some major league supernatural hoodoo. It seems that Satan (Gabriel Byrne) gets a shot at world domination only once every thousand years (and here I thought he'd pulled it off with the Republican landslide of '94). If he has sex with 20-year old Christine York (Robin Tunney), "the Chosen One," their child will be the Antichrist, or at least a brat.
Ah, but this deal has more catches than a New Year's Eve pass from a Halfway House. The unholy union must take place on December 31, 1999 (you see, 999 is just 666 turned upside down), but only between 11 p.m. and Midnight (no wonder this guy is so cranky). And if the Chosen One is given refuge in a church, the devil won't know where she is, because he can't see into the sanctuary. You know, it's kind of like Superman's X-ray vision and lead walls, only evil.
A group of guerrilla Catholic priests decide the best way to stop the situation is by killing the girl. Arnold chooses to save the girl and kick the hell out of Satan, if you'll pardon the expression. And Kevin meets up with an exploding van and has to make some decisions of his own. Oh, the anguish! Oh, the humanity! Oh, the writing!
Andrew W. Marlowe's screenplay ladles implausibility upon implausibility, from the preposterous otherworldly histrionics to his handling of Jericho Cane, Schwarzenegger's character. Cane starts the film a la Mel Gibson in the first "Lethal Weapon," preparing to put a gun in his mouth due to ongoing despondence over the murder of his wife and daughter. Twenty minutes later, he's racing through the bowels of New York City, deciphering clues that Sherlock Holmes and Kreskin would find baffling.
When Cane meets up with Christine York, he instantly switches to Terminator father figure mode, with the young woman serving as surrogate daughter. In case anyone misses the connection, the camera comes in for a close up of Christine's music box, which just happens to be identical to one owned by Cane's daughter. Subtle, Marlowe, subtle.
Speaking of cameras, director Peter Hyams is just the man to take Marlowe's script and make it even more self-important, murky and annoying. Hyams' direction shows all the subtlety of a Gwar video, with Cane running a gauntlet of ridiculous action set pieces, punctuated with loads of big explosions. Eager to satisfy Arnold's core audience, he even throws in a few pairs of breasts as well. What a guy.
Had the film delivered some decent scares, or even maintained a consistently ominous tone, the bombastic clichés might have been tolerable, but "End of Days" is simply a flaccid special effects show. The cast is just as ineffective. In his early scenes, Gabriel Byrne attempts to invest Beelzebub with some panache, but he all too soon turns into just another standard issue monster. Kevin Pollak comes and goes quickly, Robin Tunney comes off like a bargain basement Winona Ryder and as for Arnold, well … he's a better actor than Casper Van Dien. That should count for something.
Way back in the aftermath "The Exorcist" and "The Omen," supernatural swill like "End of Days" might have passed muster as a B-movie. But that was then and this is now. "The X-Files" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" deliver real scares on a weekly basis and, if we want to see the Devil, all we have to do is flip on "The 700 Club" and take a gander at Pat Robertson's grinning maw. After enduring "End of Days," all I can say is "Get thee behind me, Satan. And while you're at it, get thee a better agent as well."
© 1999 Ed Johnson-Ott
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