﻿ The Prophecy II (1998) Christopher Walken, Russell Wong, Jennifer Beals, Brittany Murphy, Eric Roberts Movie Review

The Prophecy II (1998)   3/53/53/53/53/5

Christopher Walken in The Prophecy II (1998)

Sleeping with the Angels

Gabriel (Christopher Walken) is back on Earth and he still despises God's "monkeys" and is after one in particular. That one is Valerie (Jennifer Beals) who after an accident has not only got herself involved with Danyeal (Russell Wong), who just happens to be an angel, she has fallen pregnant with his child. To some such as Monk Thomas Daggett (Bruce Abbott) this is no surprise as it was prophesised but it does mean that Gabriel will do anything to prevent the birth and that includes using Izzy (Brittany Murphy) a recently deceased teenager to try and succeed.

Maybe after years of reviewing movies I have become harder to impress and lot more cynical. It is the only reason I can come up with for not only why I rarely seem to rate movies highly these days but also why things I would once have been entertained by don't seem to work now. Take "The Prophecy II", in the first 30 minutes we have had a car sink in to a melting road, nudity, a sex scene and a graphic beating but they all ended up gimmicks to me, in some cases scenes that did little to evolve the story.

Jennifer Beals in The Prophecy II (1998)

Now in fairness "The Prophecy II" is not terrible and certainly doesn't require set piece scenes and visual effects as much as others but when you take out scenes such as one featuring a topless Jennifer Beals and what you have left is a story which skirts average at best. It just lacks something to make the storyline really grab you and so it is those set piece scenes which constantly claw your attention back rather than what is actually happening. As such once "The Prophecy II" is over you are more likely to remember that there was a sex scene in this movie or for the suicide scene involving Izzy and her boyfriend than for the actual story.

Actually there is an outside chance that you will remember "The Prophecy II" for who is in it because alongside Christopher Walken there is also Jennifer Beals and Brittany Murphy. But whilst the story focuses heavily on the character of Valerie it is Walken who makes the movie with that air of dark ominous going on although this certainly doesn't rank as a great Christopher Walken movie.

What this all boils down to is that "The Prophecy II" is an okay movie which tries hard to appeal to a cinema going audience with many a scene which now feel a bit gimmicky. But it isn't a movie which you will find yourself wanting to watch again and again, unless you are a teenage boy who notes down what movies feature sex scenes and nudity.