What do you expect from a film that has the name of a demon, the revisioned plot of Armmagedom on Earth, and Angels that are anything but angelic? In general you get a mix of The Prophesy, Terminator, and perhaps a bit of the Road Warrior.
I realize that is an odd mix of generally good to great films. And to put them all together in one film sounds strange, and unlikely. Yet Legion does all of that. Sadly the end product is not as good as any of its parts.
Let's just jump right into the plot. God has suddenly lost faith in humanity. No reason why or why now. Yet there is an unborn child that can save humanity; from what is never stated. We can stop right there.
I'm not the most religious individual. But my understanding of God, in any religion, is that the closest non-religious word would be omnipotent. How could anything stop God? Ok, taking a slightly different tack, the Angels. They are powerful beyond belief, smoting entire cities and virtually beyond comprehension to see. The Archangels are even more powerful than that.
So in this movie, these powerful beings have no choice but to takeover the bodies of the innocent (children) and weak-willed to try to kill the mother of the would be future savior. Hello Terminator. Except not one of these possessed beings has a gun, blowtorch, lighter, not even so much as a wiffle ball bat. They won't even use their cars to get into a small, unfortified, old diner where the unborn child is at.
Ok, here I am thinking again. If this is all to kill the child, why wait until mere days before the birth? Angels are not restricted by time. Why not go back to the conception of the child, or the birth of the mom-to-be? Why not have Gabriel (one of the Archangels) walk in at the very begining and kill her then? Or have a city smoting lesser angel turn the diner and all in it to salt?
Ok, over thinking. Back to the movie.
Michael (another Archangel) chooses to become human to save this woman. So he goes out to the diner in the middle of nowhere just in time for fending off the horde of possessed humans that arrive. Not that their overwhelming numbers are used to swarm the diner. All of this leading to a confrontation between the now human Michael and Gabriel.
Simply put the plot sucks. There is just too much to try to suspend your belief on. This requires more than a leap of faith it requires absolutely the vaccuation of thought.
But if you think the action will save this film, give the movie a reason to charge $9 a ticket, you will again be disappointed. There is a small bit of gunplay, mostly after the middle of the film. It's short lived, much like half of the cast. Truely there is nothing impressive about the effects or the action. Many B-movies have more and better.
So what about the cast? Well there is Paul Bettany who is a good actor and becoming a known name. He also has a penchant for quasi-religious characters (he was the albino in The DaVinci Code). He is Michael and does a decent job of being brooding, direct, and less than comforting. His action scenes are fair, and he is moderately believeable given the shortcomings of the plot.
Charles Dutton plays a short-order cook with only one hand and a prosthetic hook. You get the feeling, though it is never clear, that he might have been in Viet Nam. Of course since my father had the same prosthetic and was a vet I may be projecting. Beyond that, the character is unremarkable. He looks concerned when he should, rushes around like everyone, and dies a noble but useless death.
Then there is Dennis Quaid. Like Dutton, far better an actor than this film deserves or requires. He is the father of a key character and owner of the forlorn diner. He is a grizzled man who gave up on life as all his dreams crumbled around him. Bitter about his divorce 5 years earlier, and as lost as everyone else in this film. Quaid is believable and adds a lot of credibility to the film, but can't save it. Ditto the noble death.
I have to mention Tyrese Gibson because he is the next most well known actor in the film. His role is the obligatory thug/gangsta wannabe, with a heart. The best that can be said about his role and acting is that it does not distract from the film. He is a useless character that likely got to die a noble (but obvious and stupid) death because of Gibson's ability to draw a female and/or ghetto audience.
The effects are common and less than spectacular. The best ones can be seen in the movie trailer for the film. Actually much of the action is in the trailer as well.
The photography is at times good and adds to the atmosphere of isolation and despair, like Road Warrior. At it's worst it is too dark and murky.
The directing is on par with a B-film. You never get to feel the intensity or impending doom after the first 10 minutes of the film. In fact it feels like there was 2 seperate ideas in the film - the first more of a Terminator feel, the second more of a Prophesy rip-off.
When it's all said and done, this film is forgettable. It does not live up to the quality of the movie trailer (whoever made that should get a raise and more work). I'd more likely buy this as a DVD ($10 or so) so I could see what extras were pulled from the film, or just watch it on cable some night when insomnia had hold of me.
Do yourself a favor and don't see this film. There is a reason this was released in January, and it lives up to that reason alone.
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