Films That Witness Madness

review

PROPHECY

While not as balls-to-the-wall corny as Girdler's GRIZZLY, John Frankenheimer's PROPHECY has enough groaners and terrible special effects to appeal to those people who like their horror films with an unintentional sense of humor. Not that there's anything really funny about PROPHECY's storyline. Much of the film is played terribly straight with the narrative only taking a dive at mid-point. With JAWS being, perhaps, the only nature-run-amok - or "Eco-Horror", whichever - flick taking itself at all seriously, this wildly varying sub-genre of the horror film is ripe with potential for good philosophical discourse on man's role in his environment but almost always succumbs to the horror film's innate urge to slide down the slippery slope of nonsense. If PROPHECY were played a bit more seriously, it could have been more. As it is, it's just another story of man vs. man-in-mutant-bear suit.

Doctor Rob Vern and his wife Maggie travel up to Maine to assist in completing an EPA report concerning a dispute between the Pitney Lumber Company and the local Indians. Pitney Lumber has recently purchased a large tract of forest for use in making paper products but the road to the land has been blocked by the Indian people who claim ownership to the land - they're sarcastically referred to as "OP-ies" because they refer to themselves as "originating peoples". Rob learns from one of the Indians, John Hawks, that many of his people have been stricken ill - people have begun to act strangely, women are miscarrying, babies are being born deformed. After he and Maggie are attacked in their cabin by a raccoon - and after watching a huge salmon eat a duck! - Rob gets cracking on his research. He soon pinpoints the culprit: Mercury poisoning, the result of the paper mill's treatment of newly harvested wood. When he makes a quick trip to the site of a recent murder, he discovers the butt-ugly offspring of a giant mutant bear - caused by eating the fish swimming in the Mercury polluted waters of the lake - and takes it with him as proof. Soon, mama bear comes looking for her baby. And she's awfully pissed.

Before it becomes a completely typical monster romp, PROPHECY tries it damndest to be taken seriously. Maggie wants a child but Rob simply can't bring himself around to the idea. Working primarily in the ghettos, Rob has seen the ugly reality of life. He can't imagine bringing a new child into a world with so many children already suffering. One more borne would mean another forgotten. Their situation is further complicated when Maggie learns she is pregnant, a fact she doesn't share with her husband. Once Rob figures out that the Indians are suffering from Mercury poisoning - a condition which causes severe complications in pregnancy, not to mention possible fetal deformations - Maggie quickly realizes her position. They too have eaten the fish swimming in those waters. While this would be enough of a subplot to carry most movies of this ilk, PROPHECY completely drops it once mama bear comes calling. We're not even given closure of any sort. Maggie and Rob simply fly away in a helicopter with big, dumb grins on their faces. Hell, we don't even learn if John Hawks and his wife survive the film. It's all just glossed over.

The film's biggest flaw, however, lies in it's special effects. To call the giant bear "ridiculous" is being polite. GRIZZLY had the decency to keep it's killer bear offscreen for a large part of the film. PROPHECY shows it relentlessly in the third act. Tension is quickly drowned in howls of laughter as the mutant monster not only walks around on two legs but also walks across the length of a lake while underwater. PROPHECY is a good reminder that PG movies were not always as PG as they are now, however, as our killer bear dishes out a good bit of pain along the way. Heads are bitten off, faces are clawed, people are set on fire, and - in the film's most memorable scene - a child in a sleeping bag is bashed against a rock resulting in a huge cloud of feathers! While not very explicit, PROPHECY does manage to deliver a generous helping of monster movie mayhem.

Truth be told, this isn't a bad little film. It's just disorganized and sloppy. A little more time in the cooker and it would have turned out much, much better. As it stands, PROPHECY is a pleasant time waster and little more.

Stick with GRIZZLY for your monster bear fix. Once that's over and you start to feel that fifth or sixth beer kick in, throw in PROPHECY. You'll enjoy it a lot more.

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