The Devil’s Tomb
Sony
R4 DVD
The
Devil’s Tomb is a movie based on biblical tales of Satan, possession and Hell.
It is about The Gehenna Project (Gehenna is one of the Hebrew word for Hell)
and an age old evil which exists underground and possesses those who come in
contact with it. It is a fairly worn motif using an underground-hell like
environment, a devil figure and lots of possession with discoloured eyes and
bubbly skin !
Director
Jason Connery (son of Sean Connery) does take the elements he is offered and
works to turn it into a film seeped in atmosphere and mood. The primary way he
does this is to place the tale within the context of a war zone with all the
related military action, fast action photography and flashbacks. Indeed the war
flashbacks seen through the eyes of Cuba Gooding Jr as the military leader form
a significant part of the film.
The
acting is certainly solid with a good team including Cuba Gooding Jnr, Ray
Winstone and Ron Perlman, even Henry Rollins plays a part as a priest ! The
mixture of good actors, a military theme and some horror thrown in for good
measure certainly makes an impression.
The
underground environment packed with aggro military types mixed with occult and
religious themes certainly works well, there is lots of room for shootouts and
much blood is spilt. As a horror tale it certainly packs a nice punch in the
action and gore department.
At
the same time I have some misgivings, the plot is fairly well worn to death and
Satanic possession tales really need to bring something new to the table to
make a lasting impression. The balance between the military backstory and a
horror tale is not finely tuned, the flashbacks tend to overpower the plot and
the constant blurry, fast “war photography” becomes more than a little
annoying. Certainly as a horror story it works well enough and it has lots of
action. It does show that Jason Connery has a solid future as a director and as
his first directorial debut is pretty good.
My
major gripe is that just these sort of horror stories are a dime–a-dozen and
regardless of good special effects and great actors, they need to offer more in
regards to plot to keep the viewer interested.
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This review will appear in Volume 2 No.6 (2009) of the digital and
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