No, this movie isn't awful because of the blood and gore, it's awful because of how it's constructed, the poor pacing, the nonsensical plot, the terrible characters, and the bad comedy.
If this were a wrestling show you would get several hours of Jim Cornette ranting on it to no end.
However, it's supposed to be a comedy-horror film... but from the title, the box art, and the description, one might (wrongly) assume this is like The Prophecy meets The Keep. I mean, it's a gory film about a fallen angel... right? RIGHT?! Nope.
The gory parts are far and few between throughout three quarters of the film, mostly showcased through flashbacks that don't gel at all with the rest of the bad comedy that takes place within the film's modern day portion of the story.
Some people say the story is confusing, and to that I can almost see why. It's told in parts and scattered throughout the film, but generally, Premutos is a fallen angel, even before the likes of Lucifer, and he has the ability to resurrect the dead, making them undead.
Premutos has his undead legions cause chaos and havoc (by killing and eating people) and as people die (including his own minions) it gives him power to eventually regenerate. The problem is, Premutos is complete weaksauce.
The guy literally dies before the title appears. The guy is just that weak. Basically that's the story -- Premutos resurrected and dying over and over again throughout history leading up to the modern day era. It's hard to take him serious when he's so weak. That in itself is comical.
The film never really bothers to explain what Premutos can do if he can ever live long enough to do it, because we never get to see him for very long.
I think the premise for this story is pretty cool, but the script and execution are just awful. In the hands of a director like David Lynch, Brian de Palma, or David Cronenberg, this could have been an instant cult classic of the cool variety instead of the laughable variety.
I don't even think you can classify this as a 'B' movie but more like a 'C' movie. It really is that cheap and awful.
Also, it's way too long for its own good, with a sizable portion of the film taken up by a cringe-inducing birthday party where an annoying chatterbox character just never shuts up. Throw in some disgusting bodily fluid gags involving slimy boogers and projectile vomit and the film becomes a chore to sit through.
That's not to mention that the first half of the film follows an insufferable character played by the writer/director who is nothing but an annoying, goofy, comic-relief (there's a ten-minute comical segment about his crotch getting damaged/repaired).
After the midway point we get a really long and really awkward sex scene (no idea how the director convinced the actress to strip down completely naked for a film like this, but... there are some mysteries in life that will likely never be solved and this is one of them).
And by the end of the film we finally get the action we've been waiting for.
Now for the people saying that this is bloodier than Braindead, I must disagree. Braindead's final act was just a massive, gory, bloodfest. That was the whole point -- blood spraying every which way all the time until the credits rolled. It was both disgusting but also played up for laughs due to how absurd it was.
Here, the action isn't supposed to be as absurd (at least, I don't think it is?) and the bloodletting isn't as gratuitous as Braindead, but the gore is more pronounced. Also, to be on such a low budget, the gore effects are really, really, really well done. Some of it may make you turn away. It looks real enough.
That's the big difference between this and Braindead and why some people may say this film is "worse" than Jackson's film, because there is more inventive ways in which gore is put on display; dismemberment, faces being eaten off, eyes being ripped off, characters being torn in half, and literally some characters having all their skin ripped off and their insides pulled out. It's pretty nasty stuff.
In fact, I would say that Premutos' blood/gore effects are better than 90% of today's films. This is mostly due to the fact that most newer films have the rather unfortunate affinity toward adscititious CGI effects, rather than using on-set squib work.
The difference between CGI blood and squibbed blood are night and day, and despite Premutos being a poorly down film with a bad plot and awful comedy, the squib-work is rather top notch.
Of course, even the final affray has a tonal problem, as characters utilize nonsensical combat tactics to the point of exhausting patience or any sense of believability.
With a serious director and serious scriptwriter, this could have been an okay 'B' on the line of films like The Prophecy, Prince of Darkness, Vampires or The Keep. But instead it's like a hodge podge of badly done comedic skits wrapped around a story that's too good for it.
Where Braindead recognized itself first and foremost as a black comedy steeped within the theme of a horror film, Premutos tries to infuse an ancient evil storyline into a goofy comedy film with badly done horror and ridiculous action scenes.
If you want a good, gory, horror-comedy, Braindead is the better film. If you want a good but similar kind of horror film to watch, try The Prophecy (1995), Gabriel (2007), Prince of Darkness (1987), In The Mouth of Madness (1994), Blood Creek (2009), or Event Horizon (1997) instead.
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