dreamdayz Review of Deathwatch

Deathwatch (2002)

Okay, I appear to be the only one to have understood this movie...

[20 January 2004]

I loved this movie, so I'm a little angry about everyone trashing it without understanding it. For anyone who has just watched it and is wondering, what the f*** I invite you to look at the tagline. "Deliver them from evil." What does that suggest to you? Could it have religious significance? What do the cast say of what is stalking them? "Its Death!" Yes. The film is in fact a bloody good horror film set in WWI but it is also a religious tale in as much as the trench is Purgatory and every man jack of that squad is already dead. I finished watching this movie and thought to myself "Damn that's clever!" I mean, not to spoil the film for anyone, but it ends with all but one of the group sat around a fire in the deepest darkest depths while the star runs away from them and climbs up into the light and the mist. If there this were to be a clearer heaven and hell metaphor they'd have to hammer it into your head with a shovel. As to the dark eyed German soldier calmly waiting for the next group of unfortunates to judge... give him a cowl and a sycthe somebody? Enjoy this for the brilliant gore-fest ghost story it is with swarms of rats, living barb wire, and sheer human brutality. But look also to the story beneath the story. The evil they are to be delivered from is inside of them.