Jim Wynorski usually provides us with some excellent cheese, but this time he really let me down. This movie gets a failing grade in just about every category. The lead actor, Michael Pare, gives a completely wooden and disinterested performance. The two main actresses, though nice to look at, have a minimum of personality and aren't in the film nearly as much as they needed to be. The special effects are actually okay towards the middle of the film, but laughable at the start. So are the action sequences. The gargoyles show up right on cue - as soon as someone mentions a gargoyle in conversation, here comes a gargoyle! The opening sequence is really goofy beyond belief.
***MINOR SPOILERS***
A gargoyle is shot with a magic arrow, and it falls to earth, falling right INTO the earth, creating a perfectly round hole. Luckily, there's a boulder just a few feet away that's the perfect size to fill the hole, and even more luckily it's a very light boulder, and a few people have no trouble rolling it around.
A couple of people disappear, and our lead actor is called in to investigate. Does he look for them? No. He takes a short stroll and then quits. If he'd actually conducted a thorough search, he would probably have discovered what happened to them. That sequence is pretty indicative of how this film is laid out.
On the good side, I liked the theme music. It's pretty spooky at times. I actually think I heard something reminiscent of that Ave Satanis music from The Omen in one part. Unfortunately the spooky music isn't matched by anything spooky taking place on screen. The sets are also quite nice, one of them being an old church in Romania.
But that's not nearly enough to save this stinker. It's bad, but not in the "so bad it's good" way. It would have needed at least two good sex scenes with lots of gratuitous nudity to achieve that goal.
***MINOR SPOILERS***
A gargoyle is shot with a magic arrow, and it falls to earth, falling right INTO the earth, creating a perfectly round hole. Luckily, there's a boulder just a few feet away that's the perfect size to fill the hole, and even more luckily it's a very light boulder, and a few people have no trouble rolling it around.
A couple of people disappear, and our lead actor is called in to investigate. Does he look for them? No. He takes a short stroll and then quits. If he'd actually conducted a thorough search, he would probably have discovered what happened to them. That sequence is pretty indicative of how this film is laid out.
On the good side, I liked the theme music. It's pretty spooky at times. I actually think I heard something reminiscent of that Ave Satanis music from The Omen in one part. Unfortunately the spooky music isn't matched by anything spooky taking place on screen. The sets are also quite nice, one of them being an old church in Romania.
But that's not nearly enough to save this stinker. It's bad, but not in the "so bad it's good" way. It would have needed at least two good sex scenes with lots of gratuitous nudity to achieve that goal.