By John Mulderig
Moviegoers unwise enough to sit through the obscenely violent vengeance-driven thriller “The Crow” (Lionsgate) may end up wishing the theatre had issued them an airline-style sick bag along with their ticket. It’s a noisome tale on several levels.
The plot starts out as a love story pairing two inmates of a therapy-focused correctional institution for young people: emotionally troubled tattooed dude Eric (Bill Skarsgard) and spunky would-be singer Shelly (FKA Twigs). While Eric is behind bars for conventional reasons, Shelly is hiding out after running afoul of a band of satanists.
When, under the direction of their leader, kingpin Vincent Roeg (Danny Huston), the devil worshippers successfully track Shelly down, she and Eric escape and enjoy a brief idyll marked by numerous rolls in the hay. But a tragic turn of events cuts their time in arcadia short and subsequently leads to his transformation into the undead killing-machine “superhero” of the title.
Along the way to a nauseating climactic slaughter spree, Zach Baylin and William Schneider’s script presents viewers with a twisted view of the supernatural.
Thus the bad guys, so we’re told, have made a deal with Lucifer whereby they deliver up to him not the souls of evildoers — of whom he’s apparently had a surfeit — but those of the innocent, e.g., Shelly’s (hanky-panky notwithstanding). Later we learn that one person can liberate another from hell by consigning himself to the inferno instead.
It’s hard to concentrate on metaphysics, however, when limbs are being lopped, fountains of blood are spurting and a Samurai sword is being employed to disconnect an extra’s upper and lower jaws. To add cultural insult to visual injury, all this takes place in the elegant surroundings of an opera house.
The Crow’s gory gusto can be explained by another knotty notion in the screenplay: Only perfect revenge, Eric has been assured, will liberate Shelly from her plight.
And so one grotesquerie is piled on another. Taken all in all, director Rupert Sanders’ screen version of James O’Barr’s series of comic books – a reboot of the franchise initiated by helmer Alex Proyas in 1994 – is a repellant production no one with a conscience should patronise.
The film contains horrendous bloody violence, skewed religious notions, a vengeance theme, momentary blasphemy, semi-graphic premarital sexual activity, rear nudity, benignly viewed drug use, at least one instance each of profanity and milder swearing, pervasive rough language and about a half-dozen crude terms.
The OSV News classification is O – morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association rating is R – restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.