They've had their 2000 years. Now it's our turn.
A review by Mike Shea Movie Rating: ( * · · · · ) DVD Rating: ( * * * * * )
Ok, this one fell under the Winona Ryder rule, but I also got some weird idea that it was about vampires as well. Well, it wasn't. Apparently the makers of this piece of trash didn't make the cut on last years run of "Satan takes a holiday" movies. This movie falls right into End of Days, Stigmata and the re-release of Exorcist. Unfortunately for everyone involved, only the Excorsist stood any chance of being any good. So even with Winona Ryder, this movie almost falls into the rule about disaster chain movies, if you consider Satan coming into town and whupping some ass a disaster. Frankly I consider this movie a disaster all on it's own. The plot is just so lame. Satan is going to emerge from within some nice guy, and our heroine, Winona, finds out by decoding some crap written by some murderer. There are maybe three scenes where I might have been a little tense, but then I realized it was just gas. By about fifteen minutes into the movie, just after they introduce our idiotic victim-to-be, I was done. The only thing keeping me in the seat was Winona, who still needs about 15 more pounds on her, and the fact that I wanted to save all of you kind readers from the horrors of this movie. From the hollow characters, to the anti-climactic thrill scenes, the lame set design, lame story and horribly lame let down ending, I just can't recommend it to my enemies. Ok, at least it doesn't truly damage the film industry or our society in general by either creating hysteria or damaging the reputation of an entire sex. I wasn't in severe pain afterwards like I was when I saw Reindeer Games, but it still sucked pretty bad. Maybe this falls into the type of movie where I had wished for another plot and was struck down. I always thought that it would be interesting if the catholic church had a secret sect of demon hunters who wandered the earth as real tough guys, maybe reformed demons themselves, and took out satan's minions while the rest of us were still drooling over the new cheese-in-the-crust pizza. I thought this would have done well in End of Days, but instead they have to tie it to some level of reality. What crap. I watch movies to escape from reality, not try to get tied back into it. Movies were meant to be fantastic, like John Carpenter's Vampires. Now that was a fun movie. Instead we get the same old shlocky plotlines of normal people who find out they are satan and have to deal with it.
The DVD was one of New Line's real good ones. The picture was a dark and somber 16x9 enhanced 2.35 to 1 transfer, which fit the mood that it was trying to fit. The audio included both a DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. There was a commentary as well as a number of special features. It is too bad that movies this bad are given such high treatment while true classics like are given the finger.
It seems that the cookie cutter for satan movies is as sharp as ever, and Lost Souls is proof. Instead of trying to make something truly fantastic, we are given a movie with so little depth and such a lame story that the title is more self descriptive than anything else.
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