The Gates

Throughout most of the performance, we watch the characters gracefully move around the stage, creating an exciting spectacle. The climax gradually grows closer to the finale, attracting our attention with the supernatural frenzy of an unsettled spirit belonging to an evil sorcerer. Out of nowhere, as if materializing from another world, the character "Maria" suddenly appears - why and for what purpose?... The humorous situation develops as rapidly as it ends :) But why was this introduced, you ask? :) - I don't know either :))) The otherworldly manifestation causes a whirlwind of demonic fun - a flickering light bulb built into a musical instrument turns out to be a powerful magical force :)))))) - hands grab the viewer's face, leaving him puzzled. What's going on here? - Even I ask myself this question with good reason :)))) Finally, the climax comes - a confrontation with a vile sorcerer. The characters use a glowing light bulb inside a musical instrument, and thanks to the extraordinary efforts of the actors, this brings wonderful "fruits" - the absurdity ends the performance, leaving the curtain down and not saying goodbye, subtly hinting at a future sequel. :)))) Admittedly, this scenario was conceived by artificial intelligence - I have no other explanation.

John Rhys Davies stars in this. But at the age of 80, the blunderbuss vocal energy of his Raiders Of The Lost Ark days are gone. Then again with the stilted, monologue type dialogue he and the rest of the cast are given to work with, it's not surprising. In fact, it is so uninspiring and dull, that I found it actually painful to listen to, so only lasted 30 minutes of the 1 hour 50.

Which is a pity, as the production quality is decent. Convincing Victorian sets, street scenes, and costumes and a decent soundtrack, show an attempt to be above the B movie bracket.

Plot wise, I cannot really comment much. Victorian death row prisoners, new fangled electrickery, sciency stuff, mixed with dead prisoners ghosts and paranormal shenanigans. It all sounds too familiar.

Go watch penny Dreadful instead.

Plot

A serial killer has been sentenced to death by electric chair in London in the 1890s, but in his final hours, he puts a curse on the prison he is in, and all of those in it.

Cast

Career villain Richard Brake who is severely wasted here alongside John Rhys-Davies who is just in wall to wall abysmal movies at this stage of his career. A deserved nod however to Michael Yare who was great here.

Verdict

The cover filled me with mixed emotions, Richard Brake? Fantastic, the rest? Amateurish. I thought hey even if it's bad at least Brake will deliver a great evil twisted psychotic performance as always and who doesn't love John Rhys-Davis!? Well, it actually managed to screw my first point up rather impressively. What do I mean by that? Well Brake is the antagonist certainly, but he's barely in the movie at all and when he is it's fleeting and he doesn't really speak at al. In fact honestly I'd be surprised if he has a dozen words of dialogue in the entire movie and isn't even on screen with kills either, his presence is pretty non-existent so that's a major flaw and blatant false advertising!

The setting is interesting, the concept though cliched is fairly engaging and the film does have a few well constructed moments. Sadly then it descends into the realm of the generic and hits you with a very weak ending that is simply lazy and uninspired.

The Gates isn't bad, it's just a shadow of it's potential and that's even worse.

Rants

I get the overwhelming impression lately that a lot of movies suffer with a writing issue that starts with a writer coming up with a concept and.......nothing else. They come up with the premise of a movie, but no middle, no end just the general concept. So we're hit with that, excited about where it's to go and then the quality dips offensively and ends uninspired like they had absolutely no ideas beyond the concept. I see it all the time and it's so frustrating, if writers could come up with more than the mere basis and create a full story that would be great. Otherwise you get The Gates!

The Good

Passable premise John Rhys-Davies Nice setting

The Bad

Brake is wasted Potential squandered badly Weak finale.

One known name to head the poster: Check!

Found old prison to serve as the place where to shoot almost the entire movie: Check!

Apart from above everything about this movie is awful. Terribly awful. Oh, apart from the mass murderer, because he was actually kind of cool.

This movie reminds me of a too long and drawn out episode of some campy Sherlock Holmes episode for teenagers. Everything, apart from maybe the first two minutes, is absolutely wrong. Which is quite interesting in a way. Did they use some other director for the first two minutes, I wonder, because the first two minutes were actually dark and bloody. Immediately after that everything turned horribly boring with a horribly boring script and cast.

For a low-budget film, this one delivers superior production value and atmosphere! It's so nice to see a film that allows for the purely supernatural, without trying to explain everything in pseudoscience terms!

Good, also, to see old John Rhys-Davies in a starring role again! The principals all turn in fine performances, although a few of the lesser performers were truly atrocious (especially Lucien's associate!).

Richard Brake was a fine choice for the intensely evil William Colcott; he delivered a truly menacing performance!

All-in-all, if you don't expect too much from this modest-sized project, I think most people who appreciate a good gothic tale will find it surprisingly satisfying!