The Fallen Ones 2005 Anchor Bay Entertainment   Buy It Now

In Genesis, the first book of the Bible, there are brief accounts of giants walking the Earth. These giants are described as "the Mighty Ones of Eternity" or "mighty men which were of old, men of renown", depending on which version of the Bible you are reading. But one thing remains the same in the King James, English Standard or any other translation of Genesis 6:4...these giants were the lineage of the "sons of God" and the "daughters of man". To cut through all the verbiage and implied reference, these giants were the offspring of angel's who ventured down to Earth and found "the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose" (Genesis 6:2, King James Version). Angels bred with human women and produced a race of mighty giants who roamed the Earth both before and after the great flood (in the books of Genesis, Numbers and Deuteronomy).

I first took notice of these beings when I discovered the music of the goth rock band Fields Of The Nephilim and have always wondered why the story of these fantastic beings was never exploited further; with the exception of some story line in the Prophecy films, an "X-Files" episode, the anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, and brief appearances or mentions in video games such as "Tomb Raider: The Angel Of Darkness" and "Diablo II". Regardless of these, I have always been excited for a feature film dealing centrally with these giants...these offspring of the divine and mortal. Perhaps if I had known that when the time finally came for such a film it would be a SciFi Channel original starring Casper Van Dien...well, I may have thought twice.

The Fallen Ones was supposed to come across as a mix of Indiana Jones and The Mummy, but it really plays off more like an episode of television's "Hercules" or "Xena: The Warrior Princess"...and not a very good one at that.  While the subject matter is quite ambitious and dare I say, even fairly original, the execution is dubious at best and has managed to seem poor even when placed only next to its fellow SciFi original pictures. 

Matt Fletcher (Van Dien) becomes sort of an "accidental archaeologist" when some blasting opens a hole in the Earth, revealing a most extraordinary find...a 40 foot plus tall, mummified body.  This isn't your average, run of the mill oversized mummy either; no, this one is found right here in the good ol' U.S. of A.   Now, of course, this sort of giant mummy type creature is not going to lie dormant for several millennia without attracting a few religious-zealot followers, so of course it isn't long before Fletcher and his team of misfit bone-finders is being havocked by the modern day followers of this giant Nephilim corpse.

It seems that thousands of years ago, when angel's roamed the Earth and did the nasty with a few Earth women, it resulted in a new species.  This new addition to the population was used briefly to do some dirty work (see: the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah), but ultimately these big fellas just disgusted God; so much in fact that he decided to destroy them outright in the great flood.  One Earthbound angel, Raphael Ammon (Negahban), was not okay with all this and hatched a plan to hide away one of his progenies until after the flood, at which point the giant could be resurrected and used to wreak havoc on humanity all over again.  This angel himself hid himself away in a slightly drier place then the Earth was about to become...a little place called Hell.

So now, a two-bit archeological dig has turned up this fallen angel's little secret and, well, there is no time like the present right?  A healthy dose of angel magic later and we've got a 40 foot tall reanimated corpse stirring things up with his own brand of mischief.  There is a little something about prophecies, a little something about starting a new race of Nephilim, a little something about a mummy chasing a jeep, a little something about a 40 foot tall robotic mummy powered by humans and cables chasing a horse (yeah, that's right), a little something like acting from the cast...and then a little something about setting it up for sequels.  Uh oh.

There was a little problem with the area of the lead role for this film...namely, that it was cast with this actor, Casper Van Dien.  I don't expect much from the acting department in a SciFi original picture, or any B-grade horror flick actually...but not expecting much and being slapped across the face with a cheese grater are two entirely different things.  The "talents" of Mr. Van Dien deliver much more like the second.  I think the greatest thing I have ever heard/read about the acting of this man was posted to an Amazon.com review for this exact DVD release: "he is so bad in an 'Ed Wood' kind of way, that he almost makes you believe he's a credible actor" (IrnMdn00).  Not only do I find this completely true and hilarious, but anything said by someone with a screen name paying homage to Iron Maiden is going to get more credibility automatically.

His co-stars didn't manage to pick up much of the slack he was leaving, but the entry of a veritable who's who of televisions lost celebrities parading through the film turned the whole thing into a circus of the bizarre.  Imagine Tom Bosley (Mr. Cunningham from "Happy Days") playing a Jewish Rabbi.  Now imagine Robert Wagner (Jonathan Hart from "Hart To Hart") in perhaps the worst caliber acting appearance of his career, and long-time television maverick Geoffrey Lewis in what proves to be a role perfect for him...if it had been written as such.  Put all these elements together in a movie which begins with narration cut and edited erroneously until it appears like a preview for the very film you are already watching and you know in advance that frightening things are coming indeed...and not the good kind.

I think that if this material were handled, written and acted by entirely different people, it could have really been something; but when you fill a movie like this with people who just don't know what they are doing it is a recipe for mess soup.  I became aware that this was the problem when Chadd B. Cole, the visual effects supervisor, delivered the following line about working on this film in the included extra features: "It really appealed to me because it was a really weird cross of Indiana Jones meets The Mummy meets (pause) anythi...(stammer)...anythi...any number of horror movies...giant (pause) anything".  Yup.  This movie is definitely a tribute to all those horror movies with giant anythings.  Of course, then again the writer, director, editor himself, Kevin VanHook, said that The Fallen Ones "is cast about as perfectly as we possibly could have hoped".  So maybe it was just lowered expectations?

In an interest of being decent and fair, I must say that this disc is packed full of extra features...far beyond what I would have imagined.  There is a well made making of (which was put together well enough to challenge the feature film for quality), a featurette looking into the creation of the mummy creature, another dealing with the animatics and storyboards, a complete commentary, still galleries, storyboard galleries and even more stuff for your DVD-ROM player to extract.  For this reason alone it will be worth the $5.99 that I know you will be able to get it for soon at a Walmart near you.

Overall, I would like to say that this film isn't bad for a TV movie, which is what is seems everyone is saying, but I have to disagree on fault of the talent alone.  It is so distracting that you can't manage to enjoy what could have been at least a fun, adventurous tale. 

-aaron-
 

Directed by: Kevin VanHook   Written by: Kevin VanHook   Cast: Casper Van Dien Kristen Miller Robert Wagner Geoffrey Lewis Navid Negahban Tom Bosley Saginaw Grant Scott Whyte

DVD Features: Widescreen Presentation 1.77:1 "Giants In The Earth: The Making Of The Fallen Ones" "Creating Aramis The Mummy" Featurette "Animatics" Featurette Audio Commentary Behind-The-Scenes Still Gallery Theatrical Trailer DVD-ROM Features