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Donald Pleasence, Jameson Parker, Victor Wong, Lisa Blount, Dennis Dun ... see more see more... , Susan Blanchard , Anne Howard , Ann Yen , Ken Wright , Dirk Blocker , Jesse Lawrence Ferguson , Peter Jason , Alice Cooper , Thom Bray , Joanna Merlin , Robert Grasmere

Proving that you can never guess what you'll find when you clean out the basement, a man of the cloth discovers that ultimate evil has made a hiding place in his cellar in this tale of terror. Father ... read more read more...Loomis (Donald Pleasance) is a priest who discovers a strange object in a church basement -- a canister filled with a swirling and volatile green substance. With the help of Professor Birack (Victor Wong), Loomis discovers the startling truth about his find -- it seems that Satan, who is actually an alien life form, had a son, and the essence of the devil's spawn is trapped inside the canister. The evil spirit has been guarded by a group calling themselves "The Brotherhood of Sleep," but the spirit has the ability to free itself whenever it decides the time is right...and it seems that time is just around the corner. Prince of Darkness was directed by horror master John Carpenter; he also wrote the screenplay under the pseudonym Martin Quatermass. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

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R, 1 hr. 42 min.

Directed by: John Carpenter

Release Date: October 23, 1987

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DVD Release Date: October 10, 2000

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Flixster Reviews (770)

  • fb100000257973100
    January 20, 2012
    fb100000257973100
    To say that this is John Carpenter's worse film is, in reality, something of a mouthful. The reason is because John Carpenter is one of the finest directors we have in cinema right now and for him to make a film as bad as Prince Of Darkness is just ridiculous. But to this films c... read moreredit, it does have some merits.
    The thing about this film is that it has the factors to have been a great film. It has the atmosphere, wonderful dialogue, and the set up with religion making sense via science and math is absolutely great. Plus the idea that someone in the future is contacting these people, warning of them of what is to come, is just awesome. This film has a lot of what would have been a great horror film. But, for some reason, Carpenter messes up.
    What happened? The first thing I despised about this film is the direction. I understand the story that Carpenter was trying to tell: a priest, a scientist, and numerous collage kids investigate a giant glass chamber filled with a liquefied Satan. I like the premise, except I despised the characters saved for Donald Pleasance as The Priest and Victor Wong as Professor Birack. The others were just either poorly directed or annoying to the point that I just wished someone either fired the actors or just edited out their scenes. They are that bad. Plus with the odd choices in music selection and filmography, it leaves me to ask: Carpenter, what were you thinking? I know I am complaining a lot about this film, but it is hard for me to say anything positive when there is so much about this film I just did not care for.
    But, For the things I did like, they were beyond well done. Mainly it is the acting of Pleasance and Wong. Personally, I would of liked this film a whole lot better should this film have only them as the only characters and no one else. They are the only people I cared about, that I understood, and actually seemed like they had a brain. They are both brilliant in this film, with me liking Wong better than Pleasance. Pleasance has come a long way sense his days on Halloween, and this film shows it. But, he is able to put aside those few problems and give a rather decent performance. Same with Wong. He shows his age in this film and still gives a rather decent performance.
    Then you have the score composed by John Carpenter. This is the film in which I wish he could have just sent the screenplay to someone else and he just focused on the score. This film's score, with the exception of one piece which I will get to, is great in terms of how it sets the atmosphere, the creativity, and the overall feel for the film.
    One thing that became something of a distraction to me in this film is the rather extended cameo by Shock rock singer Alice Cooper. Yes. THAT Alice Cooper. He portrays a homeless man who, with an army of possessed hobos, act like rejected cast members from Night Of The Living Dead to such a point that near the end of this film, Night Of The Living Dead seems to have be paid a tribute to. Then you have his song Prince Of Darkness that is played at probably the worst time in the film: the first death. Okay, the silence is in place, we see a bird nailed onto a cross, then heavy metal music plays. Typically I would forgive a film that does this, but that just seems out of place and ruined the entire scene.
    Honestly, what went wrong Carpenter? What happened to your direction, your masterful way of crafting horror films? You had great elements for a film. This film was almost a perfect religious horror film, but then something went wrong. Well, I love your films, but this is sadly one of your worst and one I would only recommend to very few people.
  • kenstachnik
    March 3, 2011
    kenstachnik
    This overlooked gem from Carpenter isn't amazing, but it's pretty good. Great music to boot.
  • FilmFanatik
    December 27, 2010
    FilmFanatik
    One of Carpenter's BORING pieces. Not much here for the horror fan.
  • mumby1988
    November 9, 2010
    mumby1988
    With any kind of film surrounding the supernatural there is a very fine line between profound and preposterous, between the sublime and the ridiculous. Prince of Darkness desperately wants to be taken seriously, but it ends up every bit as laughable and stupid as Exorcist II: The... read more Heretic. While not John Carpenter's worst film (that honour is reserved for Ghosts of Mars), it remains one of his most obvious and embarrassing failures.

    Prince of Darkness is the middle instalment of Carpenter's 'apocalypse trilogy', three films which share the premise of a deadly force which could destroy humanity if fully unleashed (the others being The Thing and In the Mouth of Madness). For all the pretentions and incoherence of the latter, Prince of Darkness is by far and away the weakest of the trilogy. What should have been an interesting take on an age-old battle between good and evil ended up as a higgledy-piggledy hotchpotch of incongruent ideas, resulting in a rubbish horror movie which neither scares nor thrills.

    To be fair, Prince of Darkness is at least trying to explore a number of interesting ideas. Its central thesis is that evil is something physical, something which can be studied scientifically rather than being confined to ethics and theology. Good and evil are characterised as matter and anti-matter, and just as God came to Earth in human form to save Mankind, so evil has to inhabit the physical to unleash its full potential. There is also within the classic fear of the unknown, which Carpenter had previously explored in both Hallowe'en and The Thing. There are some fairly standard discussions about quantum theory, Schrodinger's Cat, and how logic breaks down at a sub-atomic level.

    But apart from the last five minutes, and scraps of expository dialogue throughout, these themes are barely addressed in a head-on way. The film is a mishmash of horror clichés, assembled and directed in a shambolic manner which you would not normally associate with John Carpenter. The screenplay seems to have enough ideas for three or four very different films. But rather than elaborate on any particular one, Carpenter decides to throw them altogether in the hope that all the pieces would fit.

    The plot of Prince of Darkness starts out relatively straightforward: there is a green canister in an abandoned church which has sentience and intelligence, and may or may not be the Devil. But then we have to believe that this liquid has the ability to move objects through telekinetic power, and that people can become possessed by having the liquid squirted into their mouths. And then, we have the twist involving a world behind mirrors, which probably served as the inspiration for Into the Mirror over 20 years later. And then, there's a whole caboodle about shared dreaming caused by tachyon beams from the future. The film keeps piling one badly executed plot point on top of another until all credibility has evaporated.

    This overburdening of the plot also causes a disturbing number of plot holes, some of them amusing, some of them annoying. For instance, if the canister containing the green liquid is supposed to be impregnable, how come is it leaking out and collecting on the ceiling? Come to think of it, why is it defying gravity by leaking upward? And why, oh why, do the people just stand there, open-mouthed, so the liquid can be sprayed straight at them?

    Then there are all sorts of questions raised by the concept of shared dreams. The dreams are supposedly a message from the future, warning against the return of Satan. But if Satan did return, bringing the 'anti-God' with him, surely the universe would have been destroyed and there would be no way to send the message? Alternatively, if our heroes succeed in stopping him, surely the messages wouldn't exist in the first place, and therefore the dreams would stop at the end of the film? And why do the dreams change after Danforth has gone through the mirror?

    The film is also sub-standard on a visual level. There are several half-decent locations, like the abandoned church and the university campus which resembles the quiet suburbia of Hallowe'en. And some of the special effects are okay, like the swirling canister or the decaying flesh make-up on the 'chosen one'. Beyond that, it's just another haunted house, populated by characters who deliver cheesy lines about the church being abandoned and how "this place gives me the creeps". Carpenter is a great low-budget filmmaker, but he simply doesn't do anything interesting with the location, using very conventional architecture as the main sort of threat.

    Much of Prince of Darkness is completely ridiculous, being hugely derivative of other, better horrors. The motley bunch of devil worshippers outside the church, including rock legend Alice Cooper, are a straight lift from both Rosemary's Baby and George Romero's zombie films, due to their silence and unified motion. There have been dozens of films about demonic possession, but the use of water as diabolical ectoplasm is a total rip-off of The Exorcist. The regenerating flesh of the 'chosen one' is second-rate H. P. Lovecraft, and Donald Pleasance's seemingly mad priest is pinched from Patrick Troughton's character in The Omen.

    But the biggest debt owed by Prince of Darkness is to the Quatermass series. Carpenter was a big fan of Nigel Kneale to the extent that he credited his screenplay to 'Martin Quatermass'. Ironically, Kneale was irritated by this association, due to his bad experience as the original screenwriter of Hallowe'en III: Season of the Witch. The idea of an ancient evil being something physical (or at least quantifiable) was handled superbly in The Quatermass Experiment, which took a ghostly story about possessed astronauts and turned this into a physical threat every bit as terrifying as the Thing. Prince of Darkness is like a poorly scripted, badly made version of that story, with all the true terror taken out.

    We then come to the small matter of characters. Even when Carpenter was soft-peddling, he could always be relied upon for interesting, offbeat characters who would rise to the challenge. In Prince of Darkness, the acting is wooden, the characters are bland, and the character development is almost non-existent. Brian and Danforth go straight from meeting for coffee to sleeping together, and even though there is only one kiss between them for the rest of the film, we have to believe that they are passionately in love.

    For all its great ambitions, the film is effectively a slasher by proxy. There are so many characters running around that we don't have enough time to form proper emotional bonds. Hence when people start getting picked off, we just don't care - even the sight of Alice Cooper stabbing someone with a bicycle is dull. We aren't all that sorry for Danforth when she gets dragged into the other world, before the mirror is smashed by a conveniently-placed axe, trapping her forever. If a film about pure evil can't make us connect with the good guys, then something has gone terribly wrong.

    As if that wasn't enough, we also have to put up with some out-of-place comedy. One character, played by Dennis Dun, makes all kinds of stupid verbal faux pas which are badly written and out of context. While being hunted down by the possessed women, he makes jokes about a Jewish woman marrying a African doctor, and remarks that "he's not used to being dominated by women". Such comments are every bit as stupid as the jokes in Big Trouble in Little China and add nothing at all to the story.

    Prince of Darkness is ripe, silly, cheesy trash and one of the low points of Carpenter's career. It's not as depressing a failure as Ghosts of Mars, but it fails on just about every level, both as a horror film and as pure entertainment. The experience is made all the more frustrating by Carpenter's record and the great potential hidden in its ideas. It should have been good, it could have been great - but instead it's a total stinker.
  • ScoopOnline
    December 19, 2009
    ScoopOnline
    Before man walked the earth...it slept for centuries. It is evil. It is real. It is awakening.
  • ythelastman89
    November 29, 2009
    ythelastman89
    A very interesting plot and a good idea, it just didn't have a cast to support it. There was just no one to drive the movie, Donald Pleasence can only go so far. It is definitely worth a watch, John Carpenter's signature style is written all over it. It also has his amazing score... read more, which is always a nice touch.
  • SirPant
    September 8, 2009
    SirPant
    This is by far Carpenters scariest film. The Thing had gore, The Fog had chills and Halloween pretty much invented the slasher but its Prince of Darkness with its atmospheric portrayal of inescapable and impending doom of the most evil kind that makes Carpenter one of the masters... read more of horror. Very overlooked!
  • DrBenway
    July 6, 2009
    DrBenway
    Another underrated film from Carpenter. There are a number of different types of horror films, with some of the more popular ones being tied to religion. Some of these really only work if the viewer is a believer, with the exception here and there, such as The Exorcist, that co... read moreuld've been a failure in the hands of any other director.

    Prince of Darkness is Christian horror film for a different group of people. It's horror for scientists. With the creepy atmosphere building up over the long opening credit sequence and Carpenter's signature score of impending apocalyptic doom brooding over, this movie is slowly finding its' audience and will get the respect it deserves. This is a top-grade B-movie.

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  • creepfreak
    June 14, 2008
    creepfreak
    A good little atmospheric horror flick from horror master John Carpenter. Pretty slow, but always interesting and fun. No gore or anything, but it didn't need any. It's more just about the mood, scaring us with it's creepy overtone and some truly unusual creepy as hell characters... read more(the bums especially). Alice Cooper plays one great ass freaky bum. Great acting, good script and great dark cinematography. Some spooky moments thrown into the mix as well(especially the dream sequences). Don't expect anything outstanding from this movie, it doesn't try to prove to be any better then it is. John Carpenter, as always, stays true to the genre, and most of all true to himself. He makes what he wants to make and he never tries to follow a newer trend, or anything that's become more popular at the time. He knows and completely understands exactly how horror works, and you should already kind of know what to expect when watching one of his films. Prince of Darkness is a horror film done right. It has the atmosphere. It has the story. Has it's characters, and has the horror! All finessed by a man who completely knows how the horror genre works. John Carpenter has created yet another great horror film. And all though it may not scare you as much, for it's not too realistically done, Prince of Darkness is still a fun and very enjoyable watch. Get the popcorn ready, hit the lights, and sit back and just enjoy. I highly recommend this movie!

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  • cancercapricorn2002
    October 27, 2007
    cancercapricorn2002
    This review contains some spoilers. *****************************

    John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness is a dark, tense, and disturbing journey into philosophy, religion, and man's basic, instinctive fear of the dark.

    The film begins with the death of a priest who represent... read mores the last member of an ancient, ultra-secret Catholic order that was created to guard the ultimate threat to mankind. With the death of this priest, another priest by the name of Father Loomis (appropriately portrayed by Donald Pleasance), uncovers the first priest's diary and begins to investigate this secret order of priests called "the Brotherhood of Sleep." In the process, he visits the old priest's church and, deep in the basement, discovers the mysterious secret that the Brotherhood was protecting (or rather, protecting the world from). Overwhelmed by this discovery, Loomis seeks out a physics professor by the name of Birack (capably portrayed by the late Victor Wong). Birack is also more than a little intrigued because he, in turn, summons his students for an "extra-credit" project over the weekend at the church.

    Once the students arrive at the church, and put their skills and equipment to work on a mysterious canister, the main flow of the story gets underway with results that challenge the viewer's most basic views in regard to the nature of man and the universe, of course you come to find out that the secret that the Brotherhood of Sleep was guarding is nothing less than the physical presence of Satan himself. Through the translation of an ancient text kept by the Brotherhood, Loomis and the science students discover that Satan was the son of the ultimate boogeyman: an "anti-god" who was eventually banished to "the dark side." Prior to his banishment, however, this anti-god reduced his son to a liquid state and placed him in a sophisticated capsule where he has reposed in "sleep" ever since. The goal was that Satan would sleep until the time was right for him to awaken and bring his father back from the dark side to walk the Earth again. This capsule was later discovered and eventually entrusted to the Brotherhood for its sake-keeping and careful monitoring. Prior to his death, the last guardian priest had begun to realize that Satan's spirit was finally reviving within the capsule and the hour of confrontation was drawing near.

    This film is vintage John Carpenter. It is dark, tense, and genuinely frightening at times. The film will take some time to get underway, at least for some viewers but once it does, it is well worth the effort. We are also treated to another one of Carpenter's creepy signature scores as it threads its way through the film, greatly contributing to the tension and overall atmosphere. Carpenter's films would simply not be the same without that special touch on the score. Can you imagine "Halloween" without that famous, spine-tingling track? The same holds true for "Prince of Darkness." Also, Carpenter makes use of some video "real-time" footage to create a truly eerie and memorable effect. By the way, turn up the volume during these video sequences and you'll hear confirmation of the students' theory that they are not dreams at all but actually warnings.

    a quick side note here, if you are easily offended on religious or philosophical issues, to the point where you cannot accommodate leaps into fantasy for the silver screen, then you might want to avoid this film. I have very strong beliefs in these areas as well, but it does not prevent me from enjoying a venture into film fantasy.

    The secondary plot involving the students Brian Marsh (Jameson Parker) and Catherine (Lisa Blount)provides two lead characters for us to identify with and be concerned about. Parker and Blount worked well together without stealing too much away from the main storyline. Donald Pleasance and Victor Wong are both very good as well. Also, look for Dirk Blocker (son of Dan Blocker: "Hoss" from "Bonanza") in a minor role.

    There are some great, unforgettable, vintage Carpenter moments in this film. Look for Lisa typing, zombie-like, on the computer, Wyndham's little "I've got a message for you" scene, and of course, the final frightening sequence with Jameson Parker.
    A underrated film from John Carpenter. Well worth checking out

View All Prince of Darkness Reviews

Critic Reviews

Fernando F. Croce
March 15, 2010
Fernando F. Croce, CinePassion

Carpenter's vision of collective spiritual unrest Full Review

Anton Bitel
October 5, 2008
Anton Bitel, Eye for Film

Crossing the boundary at the outer reaches of the physical world where science meets superstition and reason collides with the irrational, it tells a tale as miraculous as the Bible and as dry as any ... Full Review

Nick Schager
June 29, 2005
Nick Schager, Lessons of Darkness

Reasonably chilling. Full Review

Michael W. Phillips, Jr.
January 24, 2005
Michael W. Phillips, Jr., Goatdog's Movies

The setup is great; the payoff leaves you more than a little bit disappointed. Full Review

Blake Davis
January 14, 2005
Blake Davis, KFOR Channel 4 News

One of John Carpenter's most underrated films, gory, grim and good.

Brian Mckay
September 4, 2004
Brian Mckay, eFilmCritic.com

it's NEW and IMPROVED LIQUID SATAN!!! Full Review

Widgett Walls
September 8, 2003
Widgett Walls, Needcoffee.com

The last superlative Carpenter film. Moment of silence, please.

Ken Hanke
November 25, 2002
Ken Hanke, Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)

Among Carpenter's worst and that's saying something.

Alex Sandell
August 28, 2002
Alex Sandell, Juicy Cerebellum

An okay rental. Didn't even come close to living up to its potential.

Rob Vaux
July 26, 2002
Rob Vaux, Flipside Movie Emporium

A minor Carpenter entry, to be sure, but still weird and freaky enough to make for solid B-horror viewing.

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Prince of Darkness Trivia

  • Director John Carpenter has what he calls an Apocalypse Trilogy. The 2nd and 3rd films are "The Prince of Darkness" and "In the Mouth of Madness". What was the name of the 1st film of this "Trilogy"?  Answer »
  • What famous rock star played in the movie "Prince of Darkness"?  Answer »
  • in the movie legend who plays the prince of darkness  Answer »
  • who had a role as an undead zombie in the movie Prince Of Darkness  Answer »
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