"Resurrection" is the kind of movie that demonstrates Hollywood's inability to grasp the fundamentals that are behind cultural and religious beliefs. It introduces a plot that is supposedly about a religious fanatic killing to send the world a message but uses religion in such a false and pointless way as to make it a lame duck in the movie.
The movie stars Christopher Lambert, whose previous work has not exactly set the world on fire. I sort of enjoyed him in "Highlander" which was a goofy movie but provided him with a role that worked with his acting style. Here he plays a Louisiana cop named John Prudhomme who is on the trail of a serial killer, a role that is well-worn and is far less suited to his approach, which involves quiet, halting speech alternating with sudden outbursts. His son was killed several months ago in a car accident and he is still grieving. His marriage is a mess and when his wife invites their priest over one night he blows up at him, claiming God has abandoned him and storms out of the room. The purpose of this scene is to establish him as having lost his faith. This is as deep into theological issues as the movie is prepared to go.
But onto the serial killer. He has killed several victims, all men, aged 33, who are found with missing appendages. It is apparent that the killer is collecting these body parts, a head here, a leg here, for some purpose. After discovering that each of the men have the names of biblical apostles Prudhomme deduces without needing any further details that the killer is "rebuilding" the body of Christ in order to send a message to the world about repenting for sin. This is a big leap but he can make it because he's read the script. The movie supplies Prudhomme with a partner played by Leland Orser who is a better actor but is given a thankless role as the sidekick. His fate could be accurated predicted early on.
The movie seems to be attempting to ride on the success of "Seven", a much better movie with a similar plot, and "The X-Files". Both of these feature the same kind of cinematography as characters forge their way through dark, creepy corridors and seedy abandoned buildings. The sun hardly ever comes out, either; I think I counted 3 scenes in the entire movie in which it isn't raining.
The script falls back on every tired Hollywood convention that it can dig up, including chase scenes, false leads, grisly autopsies (with lots of nauseating closeups on the corpses) and the old-switcheroo pulled by the killer himself. The way the movie brings the killer onscreen is consistent with the way mainstream thrillers rarely include more characters than are necessary to the plot, so characters who are seemingly unecessary are almost always the killer.
The movie introduces the issue of Prudhomme being confronted with issues of faith in regards to the killer's motives but never actually deals with it, remaining doggedly focused on the hunt for the serial killer. Why bother to include this subtext at all, if it won't address it? The issue of faith figures so little into the plot that the religious overtone plays like something tacked on to try and distinguish the killing from other movies. It's what Hitchcock liked to call the MacGuffin, the thing people appear to be motivated by when it's really something else altogether. I would love to see a movie in which these themes are actually explored but this isn't it. Don't get me wrong, I am not offended by the biblical references in the movie, especially since they are largely inaccurate. I would have respected the filmmakers more if they had dropped the religious aspect and simply presented it as a standard thriller instead of hiding behind Catholic dogma. It wouldn't have saved this mess of a movie, but it would have at least been true to form.
The movie stars Christopher Lambert, whose previous work has not exactly set the world on fire. I sort of enjoyed him in "Highlander" which was a goofy movie but provided him with a role that worked with his acting style. Here he plays a Louisiana cop named John Prudhomme who is on the trail of a serial killer, a role that is well-worn and is far less suited to his approach, which involves quiet, halting speech alternating with sudden outbursts. His son was killed several months ago in a car accident and he is still grieving. His marriage is a mess and when his wife invites their priest over one night he blows up at him, claiming God has abandoned him and storms out of the room. The purpose of this scene is to establish him as having lost his faith. This is as deep into theological issues as the movie is prepared to go.
But onto the serial killer. He has killed several victims, all men, aged 33, who are found with missing appendages. It is apparent that the killer is collecting these body parts, a head here, a leg here, for some purpose. After discovering that each of the men have the names of biblical apostles Prudhomme deduces without needing any further details that the killer is "rebuilding" the body of Christ in order to send a message to the world about repenting for sin. This is a big leap but he can make it because he's read the script. The movie supplies Prudhomme with a partner played by Leland Orser who is a better actor but is given a thankless role as the sidekick. His fate could be accurated predicted early on.
The movie seems to be attempting to ride on the success of "Seven", a much better movie with a similar plot, and "The X-Files". Both of these feature the same kind of cinematography as characters forge their way through dark, creepy corridors and seedy abandoned buildings. The sun hardly ever comes out, either; I think I counted 3 scenes in the entire movie in which it isn't raining.
The script falls back on every tired Hollywood convention that it can dig up, including chase scenes, false leads, grisly autopsies (with lots of nauseating closeups on the corpses) and the old-switcheroo pulled by the killer himself. The way the movie brings the killer onscreen is consistent with the way mainstream thrillers rarely include more characters than are necessary to the plot, so characters who are seemingly unecessary are almost always the killer.
The movie introduces the issue of Prudhomme being confronted with issues of faith in regards to the killer's motives but never actually deals with it, remaining doggedly focused on the hunt for the serial killer. Why bother to include this subtext at all, if it won't address it? The issue of faith figures so little into the plot that the religious overtone plays like something tacked on to try and distinguish the killing from other movies. It's what Hitchcock liked to call the MacGuffin, the thing people appear to be motivated by when it's really something else altogether. I would love to see a movie in which these themes are actually explored but this isn't it. Don't get me wrong, I am not offended by the biblical references in the movie, especially since they are largely inaccurate. I would have respected the filmmakers more if they had dropped the religious aspect and simply presented it as a standard thriller instead of hiding behind Catholic dogma. It wouldn't have saved this mess of a movie, but it would have at least been true to form.