End of Days (1999)

It’s 1999, and instead of going to a proper party, Satan possesses the body of Gabriel Byrne and goes out to rape a particular young woman named Christine (Robin Tunney) – because thusly, the world is going to end, and Satan would win his game of cosmic whatever against God.

Some rogue (the film takes great pains to show the Pope disagrees) Catholics are trying to get in Satan’s way by simply murdering Christine. This, however, is not actually as easy as it sounds, particularly since mercenary bodyguard Jericho Cane (Arnold Schwarzenegger), an alcoholic with a tragic dead family past, becomes involved, and starts protecting Christine from both sides. How centrist of him. So its’s Schwarzenegger against Satan and his gang and the churchy murder people, hooray.

Alas, poor Arnold. In a film like this bizarre mix of millennial horror and action movie, you really need to be able to utter the portentously idiotic lines Andrew W. Marlowe’s script offers with the proper dramatic weight. Schwarzenegger doesn’t appear to even understand what the hell he is saying most of the time, so all he’s left with are old action movie poses, an air of the overly chiselled slowly going to seed and utter confusion. Which isn’t enough when a movie demands actual acting from one to only be somewhat silly instead of completely ridiculous.

Everyone around Arnold knows what kind of film they are in, so Gabriel Byrne, Robin Tunney and even Kevin Pollak chew the scenery to various appropriate degrees, leaving our supposed star in the dust in a manner I found almost cruel.

House favourite director Peter Hyams doesn’t seem to be able to draw Schwarzenegger’s old limited yet effective charisma out either, and he’s clearly either not willing or not able to get the rest of the cast to make the poor guy look any better. Where’s Carl Weather’s when you need him? Because Hyams is Hyams, the action sequences are effective, efficient and absolutely competent, though they certainly aren’t the least bit inspired.

So as a viewer, all one is left with is the whole affair’s utter ridiculousness, the stupid but very funny dialogue, the confused mythology, Byrne’s absolutely shameless performance, and a lot of explosions.

Which certainly doesn’t make End of Days any kind of hidden gem, but a rather entertaining bit of nonsense despite of itself.