Year released: 2015
THE CHARGE: Kidnapping. But is it really a crime if the guy you kidnap is the Antichrist?
THE EVIDENCE: Amazon Prime has become a breeding ground for horror. From A-list titles to zero-budget exploitation flicks, it's all there. And with probably ten times the number of titles as Netflix, it's become my go-to for checking out movies that are under the radar. Hell Fire is one of those titles, capturing my attention with its titillating cover shot of a bound man looking between the legs of a scantily-clad gun wielding woman. I went in with high hopes and low expectations... and was completely blown away.
Hell Fire opens with a man with a Matthew McConaughey drawl declaring himself to be the Antichrist. He's kidnapped by four prostitutes who believe he's setting up a major financial deal with their pimp, and they want the money for themselves.
They take him to a secluded cabin and begin torturing him to learn where the money is. But as you may expect, the Antichrist doesn't take well to such treatment. And though he's a fledgling Dark Lord still experimenting with the limits of his power, he still manages to pull some nifty stunts that turn the women against each other and sometimes even against themselves. And as the story goes on, the women find out that the Antichrist has an agenda of his own as well: he's on a mission to kill the unborn child who is the second coming of Christ, and God help anyone who gets in his way.
The inaugural Charles Manson Beauty Pageant didn't draw big ratings.
Filmed with an oversaturated color palette, the painterly look of the film really drew me in. But while the visual style and the very competently handled gory effects work got my attention, it was the acting that kept me hooked. J. Scott Green is mesmerizing as the Antichrist, giving a charismatic yet well grounded performance of a man who always has a few tricks up his sleeve... but not as many as he would like. He's equal parts hit man and con man. His character is not only flawed, he fully understands how flawed he is and tries his damnedest to hide it. It's the most humanistic portrayal of the son of Satan that I've ever seen committed to the screen.
And the women have some pretty decent acting chops themselves, especially Katelyn Marie Marshall as Justine and Selene Beretta as Rosetta. They offer such natural banter between themselves that I totally bought them as low class women with high class aspirations who spent a lot of time - maybe too much time - around each other. When the horror kicks in and things start getting freaky, the quality of their acting drops a notch as it takes a back seat to the violent visuals, but it never becomes aggressively bad. And in a low-budget romp such as this, that's a major plus.
Do I have something in my teeth?
I should also mention that the script, written by the movie's director Marc Fratto, is fantastic. It strikes a balance between great natural dialogue and soliloquies that give the actors individual moments to shine. Stylistically, it has some parallels to the classic film From Dusk Till Dawn in that it starts as a crime caper that seamlessly transitions to supernatural horror while maintaining a good amount of wry humor throughout.
Languishing at a criminally low 3.6 rating on imdb.com at the time this review was written, Hell Fire is a much better movie than that and deserves to find an appreciative audience. I implore anyone who's grown up on early films by Sam Raimi, Robert Rodriguez and Peter Jackson to check it out. It's just that damn good, a true hidden gem that every self-respecting horror aficionado with an Amazon Prime account should check out as soon as possible.
THE VERDICT: Hell Fire is NOT GUILTY of anything but egregious underuse of it's talented writer/director Marc Fratto (who, like John Carpenter, also provided much of the music). Hell Fire is only his second feature film in nearly ten years. But if it takes that long to create quality work like this, I guess I can let it slide.
