The Native Americans of Maine have been experiencing a rather high mortality rate with their children. Animals of all shapes and sizes are incredibly larger than they should be. A paper mill and these inhabitants have crossed swords to rid the area of the paper mill's influence and bring the land back to its original peoples. But fighting ensues, and the EPA gets involved by sending a doctor to help examine the problems of the area. What does he find? Some contaminants have caused the wildlife to mutate and create animal mutations that have become bloodthirsty, destructive, killing machines - in particular some huge bear-monster thing which we really never get a real close look at long enough to see just how bad the special effects really are. Prophecy is NOT a good movie but is entertaining to a degree. It has in the directorial helm one of the film's greats in John Frankenheimer. Frankenheimer usually is able to capture a very pervasive mood and create rich suspense and deep characters, but not in Prophecy. It looks like he has a real small budget - and it shows. The mutants are ridiculous(particularly the babies). The viewer that called them monster muppets is right on track with that observation. Muppets don't scare. Nor are they very credible. And that is just one of the major flaws of the film. If you cannot suspend disbelief enough to imagine what is going on the screen is even remotely plausible, then the film is going to have trouble working. That being said, some of the film is effective - particularly the scenes where the mutant is NOT shown like with the campers(almost not shown). Prophecy also suffers from some bad miscasting, not necessarily bad acting. Robert Foxworth is just downright annoying in the lead as some super liberal out to change the world according to his ideas. He is one-dimensional all the way. Talia Shire plays his wife and gives the film some much needed credibility both with her name and more importantly her performance. She was rather good. Richard Dysart also does a credible job in his role as the guy in charge of the paper mill's position. But the most laughable casting has Armand Assante playing a Native American in charge of the fight against the mill. Any of you buying Armand in this role? Not me! Prophecy is one of those horror films that wants you to believe that the message it has underscores all the lame special effects and other flaws. Sure, it has a message, but that does not excuse it from being bad. Let's not make it out to be more than what it really is: a cheaply-made, funny in ways it should not be, interesting horror film from that decade where films were made about anything - the 70's.
Review of Prophecy
