Somewhere in an office about two years ago, a man sat in an office chair with his legs stretched out before him and his hands clasped behind his head.  As he sat there, his eyes lazily roamed over the framed movie posters and portraits of himself that adorned the walls.  The cool air from the vents blew swirls in the cigarette smoke that curled up from his left hand.  Without the slightest bit of irony or self-deprecation, his lips parted and he very softly uttered the following phrase:

After those words were uttered, nothing could stop the ultimate creation of the movie Gabriel, which was created for one purpose and one purpose only. 

To waste my fucking time.

The thing is, I have no one to blame for watching this but myself.  There’s an old story you’ve probably heard before. It’s the one about the old woman who finds an injured viper.  She nurses it back to health and then one day, it bites her.  As she lies on the ground, clinging to life by a thread, she asks, “Why did you bite me?”  The viper answers, “Because I’m a viper.”

Gabriel is that viper, only it crawled through a field of shit first and then threw up all over me “2 girls 1 cup”-style, before sinking in it’s fangs.  Seriously, I’m the one who looked at the release schedule.  I’m the one who read the marketing pitch in the staff writer forum and ultimately, against every warning screaming at me from years of watching sci-fi and horror films, I’m the one who typed the words, “I’ll take Gabriel.”

That’s right.  There is no one at fault here but me, but that’s never stopped me from pointing fingers before.  So grab a poncho and get comfortable while I rain hatred upon this movie.

First off, you know you’re in trouble when you have to sit through four separate screens of written exposition just to get to the first actual scene.  Anytime you see that, trust me.  Get up and walk out of the theater.  If it’s a rental, pull it out of the DVD player.  If it’s from Netflix, break the disc and report it damaged.  That way you may be saving some other poor soul from watching it.

Allow me to sate your curiosity and spare you some pain.  It’s a lot like American politics.   There’s heaven.  There’s hell.  There’s a middle ground for the souls not judged yet.  It’s  called purgatory.  There are warriors from both sides fighting for the undecided souls.  Each side only gets six warriors.  Heaven’s losing and they’re on their last turn.  Guess which side is the democrats.

There… see I did it in one paragraph.  Now imagine that in 10-point type, fleshed out over four screens with a CGI milky way in the background.  Hurts to think about, doesn’t it? 

What really sucks though is this exposition was the best part of the movie because it was the only part of the movie where people were not doing a poor job of acting.  That’s right, everyone either overacts in this piece of shit or they don’t act at all.  It’s like they told the bad guys, “Be sure to hiss when you talk.”  With the good guys they said, “Hey, I know you’ve only done community theater and some infomercials, but just say these lines like you’re talking to the cashier at your local grocery store and you’ll be fine.” 

Now, having said that the story is banal and the acting sucks doesn’t really explain why I hated this movie so much.  Seriously, the same thing could be said about a lot of films that I happened to enjoy.  However, this movie fundamentally plays to its weaknesses because instead of having everyone duke it out in a tight 90 – 100 minute sci-fi action flick, they made sure that everyone talks. 

They talk a lot. 

In fact, they talk so much that you might begin to think that originally the movie was supposed to be a series of debates on whether or not the holes in this plot should be adequately filled.

Erase that thought from your mind though because I can assure you, that debate never fucking happened.

Let’s give credit where credit is due though.  For all that talking, someone realized that things weren’t moving fast enough.  So they broke up the talking with MTV-style edits… of people talking.  Ever watch a riveting conversation as the camera swirls around the two people speaking?  Well you won’t here either because the conversation isn’t riveting in the least.

The only solid bit of praise I can give is that the makeup looks very good. Seriously, the characters are made up very well.  The CGI sucks balls but the actual makeup effects are damn good.

Look, I like my Judeo-Christian sci-fi and horror as much as the next guy.  Hell, I’ve even watched the entire series of Prophecy films (I’m talking about the Christopher Walken ones, not the mutant bear one from the 70s).  The fact is though, that this movie bored me so much that 60 minutes into it, I skipped to the last three chapters, buzzed through the extras and then immediately popped in Tenacious D In The Pick Of Destiny. 

I considered it a palate cleanser.

If at this point in the review, you’re still considering watching this you should know that the bad guy is the arc-angel Michael who has turned to the dark side.  That’s why he’s so powerful.  Star Wars anyone? 

So yeah… that’s the major spoiler.  Thank me in the forums.



Presentation
It’s dark.  Not just a little dark, but really dark.  That’s not a good thing though.  Think Underworld or Spawn… only darker.  Then, once you’ve got that image in your mind, imagine that someone shot the lights out.  You’d be close then.   It’s dark like the worst digital videogame world ever created is dark.  On a good note, the blacks are pretty rich.

Audio is a whole other beast though.  Seriously, I’m not being melodramatic in saying this.  This movie was shot entirely in English.  Its core audience is an English speaking audience.  I was born and have lived 36 of my 39 years in the United States of America.  I implore you to read this next sentence and let it sink in.

This is the first English language movie that I have EVER had to turn the English subtitles option on during my viewing. 

Basically, the thunder or thunderous booms of violence are super loud, while the people all talk in menacing low tones.  The result is that even the sound of the rain drowns out the conversations in a movie that is 90 percent conversation.  It is very annoying.

Extras
Basically, you get some deleted scenes and the requisite three part featurette series covering the beginning of the project, the shooting and then the effects done in postproduction.  There are also previews for Southland Tales and Stripper Zombies.

Heaven and Earth yawn in unison.

The Bottom Line
If you just can’t get enough of CGI worlds, mumbled dialogue and think that Underworld really would have been much better if there had been more talking and less action, then you will likely spontaneously climax repeatedly during Gabriel. 

If you fall into the category above, I pray we never meet.