hollywood never fails to astound me . every time i think those coked-up little buggers have hit rock bottom ; they come up with a new excavating tool . i was truly convinced that " wild wild west " marked 1999 studio filmmaking at its most hapless , but then along comes " end of days " to prove me wrong . this big budget , brain dead apocalyptic thriller bludgeons its audience with overwrought music , grisly violence , explosions galore and lots of cheesy special effects . the result ? nothing but groans and yawns . even the devil himself is unable to produce a decent scare in this festival of the inept . at the very least , " end of days " should have done us the courtesy of being bad-enough-to-be-good , but it can't even manage that . it's just lousy . arnold schwarzenegger , still recovering from heart problems and " batman & robin , " plays an ex-cop turned security agent or bodyguard or something . along with his obligatory comic relief partner ( kevin pollak , impersonating matthew perry's chandler character from " friends " ) , he gets involved in some major league supernatural hoodoo . it seems that satan ( gabriel byrne ) gets a shot at world domination only once every thousand years ( and here i thought he'd pulled it off with the republican landslide of '94 ) . if he has sex with 20-year old christine york ( robin tunney ) , " the chosen one , " their child will be the antichrist , or at least a brat . ah , but this deal has more catches than a new year's eve pass from a halfway house . the unholy union must take place on december 31 , 1999 ( you see , 999 is just 666 turned upside down ) , but only between 11 p . m . and midnight ( no wonder this guy is so cranky ) . and if the chosen one is given refuge in a church , the devil won't know where she is , because he can't see into the sanctuary . you know , it's kind of like superman's x-ray vision and lead walls , only evil . a group of guerrilla catholic priests decide the best way to stop the situation is by killing the girl . arnold chooses to save the girl and kick the hell out of satan , if you'll pardon the expression . and kevin meets up with an exploding van and has to make some decisions of his own . oh , the anguish ! oh , the humanity ! oh , the writing ! andrew w . marlowe's screenplay ladles implausibility upon implausibility , from the preposterous otherworldly histrionics to his handling of jericho cane , schwarzenegger's character . cane starts the film a la mel gibson in the first " lethal weapon , " preparing to put a gun in his mouth due to ongoing despondence over the murder of his wife and daughter . twenty minutes later , he's racing through the bowels of new york city , deciphering clues that sherlock holmes and kreskin would find baffling . when cane meets up with christine york , he instantly switches to terminator father figure mode , with the young woman serving as surrogate daughter . in case anyone misses the connection , the camera comes in for a close up of christine's music box , which just happens to be identical to one owned by cane's daughter . subtle , marlowe , subtle . speaking of cameras , director peter hyams is just the man to take marlowe's script and make it even more self-important , murky and annoying . hyams' direction shows all the subtlety of a gwar video , with cane running a gauntlet of ridiculous action set pieces , punctuated with loads of big explosions . eager to satisfy arnold's core audience , he even throws in a few pairs of breasts as well . what a guy . had the film delivered some decent scares , or even maintained a consistently ominous tone , the bombastic clich ? s might have been tolerable , but " end of days " is simply a flaccid special effects show . the cast is just as ineffective . in his early scenes , gabriel byrne attempts to invest beelzebub with some panache , but he all too soon turns into just another standard issue monster . kevin pollak comes and goes quickly , robin tunney comes off like a bargain basement winona ryder and as for arnold , well ? he's a better actor than casper van dien . that should count for something . way back in the aftermath " the exorcist " and " the omen , " supernatural swill like " end of days " might have passed muster as a b-movie . but that was then and this is now . " the x-files " and " buffy the vampire slayer " deliver real scares on a weekly basis and , if we want to see the devil , all we have to do is flip on " the 700 club " and take a gander at pat robertson's grinning maw . after enduring " end of days , " all i can say is " get thee behind me , satan . and while you're at it , get thee a better agent as well . "
