Warlock: The Armageddon (1993)

(In French, On Cable TV, October 2020) Oh no! Another sorcerer coming to our world to end it! What do they get out of it? Isn’t it lucky that we always have someone ready to fight him? Wouldn’t we be better off if they had their way once in a while? Such are the questions that pop up unbidden during the lengthier stretches of Warlock: The Armageddon, a rather dull film occasionally enlivened by imaginative sequences. It’s really not worth watching for its over-familiar plot: As a warlock (Julian Sands, whose presence greatly exceeds his acting talents) roams the United States in search of the magical doodads what will enable him to summon Satan and end the world, older protectors train their young recruit in order to stop the warlock dead (again). This is basic stuff, regurgitated from low-grade horror clichés. But where Warlock: The Armageddon does slightly better is in the more memorable sequences that pepper the humdrum narrative: the antagonist makes his entrance in a disturbing and more effective than expected birthing scene that clearly shows that the film was scripted by a man. One of the deaths makes effective use of a skylight. There’s a rather good sequence showing the antagonist being vulnerable to the spells of his opponents at a distance. Every so often, Warlock: The Armageddon has zingers of interest, even if the overall quality of the result really isn’t worth crowing about. Still, I’ll take it—many horror movies can’t even achieve even one effective sequence, bet alone a handful. Plus, there’s Sands hamming it up, as a warlock coming to free the devil—they simply don’t make them like that any more.  Thankfully.