The Prophecy 3: The Ascent (2000)

Director: Patrick Lussier

Cast: Christopher Walken, Vincent Spano, Dave Buzzotta

Synopsis: Danyael is the offspring of an angel and a mortal woman. After being gunned down in a seemingly fatal shooting, he rises from the dead and realizes he possesses great powers.

It’s a case of more of the same in The Prophecy 3: The Ascent, the third instalment of the Prophecy series, and by now the quality of storyline is coming perilously close to the level of your standard stalk-and-slash flick. Not as dark as No 2, and not so impenetrable, Prophecy 3 does at least move at a faster pace, even though there is very little to absorb the viewer.

Struggling to fill its short running time of 83 minutes, the movie is padded with regular and monotonous flashbacks/visions of new hero Danyael (Dave Buzzotta), which are presumably intended to intrigue the viewer but only succeed in first confusing, and then boring them. Patrick Lussier’s flashy, tricksy direction is also a major distraction that adds nothing. Christopher Walken (The Deer Hunter, Pulp Fiction), the one constant throughout the series, swaps over to the good side in this one, and is relegated to a supporting role, which is a shame because he is always interesting to watch. Despite this, he has the best scene in the movie – driving along a desert highway, playing his horn to Telstar (I think) on the radio; totally irrelevant to the plot, and at odds with the tone of the movie, but a real nice surprise in the midst of all the mediocrity. Vincent Spano is ok as the new bad guy, but he just can’t compete with Walken in the previous two movies.

The Prophecy 3: The Ascent is for die-hard fans of the series only.

(Reviewed 11th May 2002)