Legion (2010) review

Legion

It is appropriate to review this movie in the Composter’s Union Quarterly Newsletter for several reasons. First, we compost to save the planet, and so any apocalyptic theme is fair game. Second, it is a mishmash of reused themes and elements from other movies. Third, I feel like it.

Paul Bellamy is engaging as always. Here he is the Archangel Michael rebelling against Big G because after several thousand years of humans just fucking killin’ each other and shit Big G is just fed up wi’ da BULLSHIT. Or is he?

Spoiler alert! But if anything I say about this movie comes as a surprise to you…

There are other people in this movie, notably Dennis Quaid, Lucas Black, Tyrese Gibson, Charles Dutton and Kevin Durand. There is also some Maxim-model type chick named Adrianne Palicki, who apparently was on that show “Friday Night Lights,” which I for one do not give a fuck about. Kevin Durand is probably the second closest thing to a hot commodity (Bellamy has about 5 movies coming out and makes 2 to 5 a year), coming off of a villainous couple seasons on “Lost” and recently playing a Merry Man in “Robin Hood” with Russell Crowe.

Durand’s turn as Archangel Gabriel has the most intentional or perhaps unintentionally ironic aspect to this movie, as he immediately reminds the viewer of Christopher Walken in the “Prophecy” series of movies (which started out really strong, but got to suckin’, as all series of movies do…). Walken’s Gabriel was a font of dry (and very mean-spirited) humor, but Durand is serious as a heart attack and not funny, except that it’s such a blatant homage/rip-off/whatever the viewer has to check hisself afore he wrecks hisself repeatedly.

As an aside, interesting that Gabriel is always the bad guy; the “Prophecy” films and also in “Constantine,” as played by Tilda Swinton.

Anyway, the story is this: Big G is out to exterminate mankind for general assholery. Michael says Big G told him to love mankind and he ain’t walkin’ out on mankind now, no sir. He flees to earth, cuts his wings off a la Ben Affleck in “Dogma” (the angels regular getup is a Roman centurion suit like in “Dogma” also, but less cheesy looking, much darker), and hits an arms stash he either KNOWS about or stashed himself. If he stashed it himself, he forgot his key, because he blows the doors off (in the shape of a cross) to get out.

Meanwhile, at one of those desert gas station/diners that apparently litter the desert at safe enough distances that you can’t see the next one (but which also are 50 miles from the next stop), Dennis Quaid is having trouble getting anything on his diner’s beat-to-hell TV. Charles Dutton is chuckling away at the fryer, like one sort of wise and peaceful cinematic black man does. Tyrese Gibson is toolin’ across the desert all angry and shit, as another sort of younger, more angry and shit, young black man does. He’s also got a big ass gun, because angry as shit young black men carry guns. Lucas Black is Dennis Quaid’s son and has the same expression on his face he had in “Sling Blade” when he was a kid, in other words, a furrowed brow. He loves this slutty waitress, carrying an illegitimate baby in her belly that she is going to give up for adoption. He says we can raise it together. She gives him a look like, “damn, son, I can’t even name this baby daddy and you want to hook up with ME?” or maybe “Shit, I can do a hell of a lot better than you,” or maybe “Shut the fuck up and get me some pickles and ice cream, bitch.”

Dennis tells the kid the chick is a slut, no offense, but fuckin’ forget about her.

An old lady drives in, orders a raw steak, eats it, says some really mean shit to the slutty waitress about dead babies, and best of all, drops the “See-you-next-Tuesday” bomb on her, which REALLY freaks everybody out, because, you know, women HATE that word. Then the old lady gets “shark teeth” and climbs the wall up onto the ceiling. She bites a guy really bad on the neck. Tyrese pulls out his gat and shoots the old lady. Lucas is sad ‘cuz he had her in his crosshairs and couldn’t pull the trigger.

Michael shows up in a cop car. He don’t look like no cop. He gives everybody guns. There’s a big cloud coming. It is flies and locusts. Oh shit, that’s gross. An ice cream truck pulls up. It’s a scary ice cream man. Oh shit. His legs and arms are all stretchy and he changes into a monster-lookin’ motherfucker. They shoot the shit out of him.

So, while Michael, and later Gabriel, manifests on earth in their actual handsome-boy-modeling-school angel faces and 6-hours a-day workout bodies, everybody else is a joe-schmoe extra possessed by an angel.

Yes, back to the theme, Big G is sending his angels to wipe out humanity, because of all the bullshit. But first, they have to kill the slutty waitress’ baby, who is the only hope for mankind (“Terminator,” “The Prophecy,” “The Bible”).

Lots more angels come. More sharks teeth. Some of them are punky lookin’ bikers. Oh shit. One of them gets blasted by the good guys and Charles Dutton is standing by it and gets a bunch of angel blood on him, which kills him, because it’s like acid (“Alien”), even though it’s really a possessed human, and wouldn’t they have the same blood as a regular human, plus, when Michael cut his wings off, why, we don’t really know, but his blood was red and apparently NOT highly corrosive, because he put some clothes on right after stitching himself up (remarkably small wounds, too, for cutting off some giant fuckin’ wings).

Gabriel comes. He fights Michael, a whole lot. Wings are badass. They are bullet-proof, though presumably the rest of the angel is not, because Michael is using a gun to try to fight Gabriel. Gabriel kicks Michael’s ass, though somewhat forlornly, because they’re buds. Gabriel kills Michael, who, of course, turns into some kind of flaming, sparkling gold dust and disappears. Gabriel starts to work on the witnesses.

He’s about to kill the baby, then, WHAT THE FUCK!!!??? It’s Michael, back as an angel, and he kicks Gabe’s ass, who get’s shipped off to Hell or something.

Bullshit. The main thing this movie had going for it was the idea that Big G might be an asshole, or even if he’s not, that mankind must now rebel against Big G’s will and try to survive. But now with this, “plot within a plot within a test within a trick” bullshit, we’re back to square one. Except that apparently lost and lots of people got they asses killed, since Lucas and Slutty (a.k.a “Joseph and Mary”) with their little illegitimate messiah in utero, seek out some stronghold of resistance that have cropped up. They drive off into the sunset, with a bunch of guns (“Terminator,” “Mad Max,” “The Road Warrior,” “The Bible” etc.), presumably heading for the sequel.

Bullshit. But overall, not the worst waste of 100 minutes in the history of cinema. 2 and a half out of 5 compost heaps.