and i thought " stigmata " would be the worst religiously - oriented thriller released this year .
turns out i was wrong , because while " stigmata " was merely boring and self - important , " end of days " is completely inept on all fronts .
it 's a silly , incomprehensible , endlessly stupid mess .
for a guy like me who grew up watching arnold schwarzenegger at his best , it 's extremely disconcerting to see where the big man has ended up .
for the first time in recent memory , an arnold action movie ( and " batman & robin " does n't count ) is no fun at all .
" end of days " is a major stinker .
the movie opens in vatican city , 1979 .
some catholic priests have observed an ancient prophecy , which says that a girl will be born on that night that satan will have targeted for impregnation .
if he impregnates her between 11 and midnight on december 31 , 1999 , the world will be destroyed .
the pope orders protection of this girl , though some priests believe she ought to be killed .
in new york , that very night , a girl is born to fulfill the prophecy .
twenty years later , we meet jericho cane ( schwarzenegger ) , a suicidal ex - cop with a drinking problem .
now working as a security guard for hire , he is protecting a local businessman ( gabriel byrne ) , who is actually possessed by the devil .
an assassination attempt on the businessman by a crazed former priest leads him to the girl satan is after , christine york ( robin tunney ) .
recognizing elements of his own murdered daughter in christine ( including ownership of the same music box , apparently ) , jericho swears to protect her against the devil and the faction of priests looking to kill her .
there are so many problems with this film
it 's hard to know where to begin , but how about starting with the concept ?
casting arnold in a role like this was a mistake to begin with .
schwarzenegger is a persona , not an actor , so putting him in a role that contradicts his usual strong personality is a bad idea .
arnold has neither the dramatic range nor the speaking ability to pull off a character tormented by conflicting emotions .
in other words , trying to give him dimension was a mistake .
harrison ford , mel gibson , or even bruce willis could have played this role ( they 've all played noble and flawed heroes ) , but not schwarzenegger .
there are several scenes that attempt to establish jericho 's character ; one has him contemplating suicide , another crying over the loss of his wife and daughter , and even one in which the devil tries to tempt him into revealing christine 's location by offering him his old life back .
none of these scenes really work , because arnie is n't up to the task .
the filmmakers would have been better off making jericho a strong , confident character ( like the terminator , for example ) , the likes of which schwarzenegger has excelled in before .
this one is n't at all believable the way arnold plays him .
the supporting cast tries their hardest , and only gabriel byrne makes any impact at all .
as the prince of darkness , he 's suave and confident .
he acts like one would expect the devil to act .
the problem is that the script has him doing things that make no sense ( more on that later ) and that undermines him as a powerful villain .
byrne out - performs arnold in every scene they have together ( including the aforementioned temptation bit ) , but this is problematic when it causes the audience to start doing the unthinkable : root for the devil .
byrne 's speech about the bible being " overrated
" actually starts to make sense , mainly because arnold 's attempts at refuting it ( mostly of the " ' tis not !
" variety ) are feeble at best .
the only problem is , arnold has to win , so in the end , nobody really cares .
kevin pollack
plays jericho 's security guard sidekick and tries to liven things up with some comic asides , but
like most bad action movie sidekicks , he disappears after about an hour .
robin tunney is n't given much to do except look scared .
in fact , all of the supporting players are good actors , but none , save for byrne , is given anything interesting to do .
performances aside , it would be really hard to enjoy this film
no matter who starred in it .
this being an action blockbuster
, it 's no surprise that the worst thing about it is the script , which starts off totally confusing , and when some of it is explained ( and not much of it is ) ,
it 's utterly ridiculous .
why is the devil coming on new year 's eve , 1999 ?
because it 's exactly 1000 years after the year of the devil , which is n't 666 , it turns out .
some nutty priest accidentally read it upside down , so the real year is 999 , so just add a 1 to the beginning , and you 've got 1999 ! if you do n't buy this explanation , you 're not alone .
it 's convoluted and silly at the same time .
the method by which jericho locates christine york is equally ludicrous
( she 's christine , see , and she lives in new york , see . . . )
, and if that were n't bad enough , there 's plenty of bothersome stuff in this film that is n't explained at all .
why can satan kill everyone he passes on the street , but when it comes to snuffing out one drunk ex - cop , he 's powerless ?
is he impervious to only one kind of bullet ?
how come
he ca n't control jericho or christine ?
and how did those gregorian monks deal with time zones in their prophecies ?
a clumsy attempt at a joke is made about this , but it 's never actually explained .
usually , this sort of thing would n't matter in a schwarzenegger flick ( i mean , do n't get me started on the time paradoxes offered up by the terminator movies ) , but this time the plot inconsistencies stand out even more than usual because the action is rarely exciting .
there are several predictable horror film clich ?
s present in " end of days , " complete with the old " black cat hiding in a cabinet " bit ,
not that we ever find out what the cat was doing in there .
it gets so formulaic
that it 's possible for those uninterested in being scared to close their eyes at the precise moment a " boo " will come .
their predictions will rarely be wrong .
the more grandiose action sequences are utterly charmless , partially because we do n't care about these characters ( due to the script 's pathetic attempts at characterization and setup ) , and also because they , too , do n't make any sense
.
there 's a scene where schwarzenegger gets thrown around a room by a little old lady .
it 's good for a few chuckles , but not much else .
supposedly we 're to believe she now has super strength by virtue of being controlled by satan , but the script never sets that up , so the scene is merely silly .
none of this is terribly exciting , because all the action sequences are so badly framed that it 's often hard to tell why it 's happening in the first place , not to mention that they 're edited in full - on incomprehensible mtv quick - cut style .
most of them had me scratching my head , rather than saying , " wow , cool ! "
" end of days " is not only silly and confusing , but it 's also distinctly unpleasant to watch .
the devil apparently does n't operate in the more subtle , i'll - convince - people - to - kill - each - other fashion outlined in the bible , but instead enjoys killing people gruesomely in broad daylight .
this does n't only make him an awfully predictable sort , but it also means that not a single scene in " end of days " goes by without unnecessarily graphic violence , or the odd kinky sexual encounter ( yet another bit that had me scratching my head ) .
if violence is supposed to be shocking , it 's not a good idea to throw so much of it into a movie that the audience goes numb .
scenes are n't connected through any reasonable means , so a lot of the time , stuff gets blown up , or people get killed , and i had no idea why .
reasons ?
to hell with reasons !
let 's just blow stuff up !
is n't it cool ?
nope , not by a long shot .
this film is thoroughly unwatchable .
it 's dull , interminable , and unrelenting in its stupidity .
perhaps arnold needs to make some movies with james cameron to revive his career , because it 's not happening with hack peter hyams here .
" end of days " might have had camp value , if only it did n't top itself off with an overly pious ending that nobody 's going to buy .
if the movie is going to be serious , the filmmakers should have come up with a decent script .
if it 's going to be campy , arnold should n't be taking himself so damn seriously
( i did n't actually see him put up on a cross , did i ? ) , and his character should n't be such a sad sack .
as it stands , " end of days " is just a bad movie , and an awfully gloomy one at that .
Output: N