Denzel Washington and Embeth Davidtz on the run from a nasty Demon in Fallen |
Director: Gregory Hoblit
Cast: Denzel Washington (Detective John Hobbes), John
Goodman (Detective Jonesy), Donald Sutherland (Lt. Stanton), Embeth Davidtz
(Gretta Milano), James Gandolfini (Lou), Elias Koteas (Edgar Reese), Gabriel
Casseus (Art Hobbes)
Every so often, a film comes round that you know, while you watch it, is a fairly average,
unspectacular piece of film-making. But for some reason something about the
film just clicks with you and you end up enjoying something basically nothing
special. For me, Fallen is one of
those films.
What’s particularly nice about having this film as a bit of
a guilty pleasure is, I’m pretty sure, most people have never heard of it.
Detective John Hobbes (Denzel Washington) has recently been present at the
execution of a notorious serial killer. Moments before his death, the killer
grabs his hand and mutters a message in a strange language. As a copycat killer
continues the crimes – and begins to frame Hobbes – the detective slowly
realises his nemesis is no man, but a demon, able to possess humans by touch.
He failed to possess Hobbes – and now wants to destroy his life.
There is nothing really new here: Hobbes is straight out of
film noir, while the plotline of his mentally handicapped brother raising a son
is pure TV-movie of the week. The demon possession idea is not exactly new
(although it’s snazzily shot) and the demon quickly heads the way of most
creatures in these films: foul-mouthed and delighting in sex and violence.
There is a secret underground movement of those aware of the demons on Earth
(fortunately we only see one of them) combatting their evil. Nothing really
new.
But Fallen makes
these elements seem somewhat fresh. The idea of the demon moving from
person-to-person via touch is very interestingly presented. At one point Hobbes
has a conversation with the demon, as it switches from host to host. Later Gretta
(Embeth Davidtz) is pursued down the street by the demon, moving swiftly from
person to person in a chain of touching hands. The various actors do a good job
of conveying a single consistent character for the demon (fortunately he
favours possessing recognisable character actors from US TV drama). Hoblit’s
direction has plenty of these interesting new ways of presenting things. He’s
also able to keep a good air of menace throughout the film.
It’s not perfect of course. The investigation of the demon’s
background hits all the familiar beats from Dante to the Bible. Hobbes must be
the only person in the world who (having decoded a message) has to ask A NUN
whether the word “Apocalypse” means anything to her. A detective who has never
heard of the word apocalypse? Times have changed: it’s the sub-title to an
average X-Men film now. At least one
character is so obviously set-up as a candidate for long-term possession, you
immediately suspect he’s innocent.
But the film has a fine closing scene, and a decent twist
which plays with your initial expectations. It also gives you plenty of clues
throughout (from the first shot of the film) about how the action might play
out, more than enough for you to work it out for yourself. The idea of the
“final confrontation in the wilderness” is again a familiar one, but the
supernatural element makes this feel different. It’s actually a twist I didn’t
see coming first time around (I was young at the time, not sure if I would be
caught again today) – but it’s well presented and doesn’t cheat the audience.
Probably the main reason the film works so well though is
Denzel Washington. Here is an actor giving a performance probably beyond the
material, encouraging others to lift their game. He perfectly captures both
Hobbes’ dedication and his purity of soul, with plenty of little touches that
never feel heavy handed. He makes the plotline with his brother hugely sweet. He
gets the balance just right between scepticism and dawning horror. It’s a real
professional performance that plays off his charisma very well – imagine how
awful it would have been with Keanu Reeves in the lead.
But I love that twist ending, and I’m a sucker for these
demonic possession films (like disaster films or period epics) so I’ve seen
this 3-4 times and really enjoyed it each time. As well as Washington, John
Goodman and Embeth Davidtz give very good performances, and there is always
enough mystery that you never feel you are racing far ahead of the film (of course we know from
day one it’s about demonic possession, but the characters never feel dense
catching up with us). Fallen is a
high quality piece of B-movie thrills. If you haven’t heard of it, do check it
out.
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