It stars Shatner in a small-ish role as the father of our main protagonist, John, and he seems to be so permanently gritted teeth angry that there's nowhere for him to go when he needs to get really angry. He also has the best line in the film: 'Go back and find it (the relic) ... or I'll blow your brains all over that horse!'
The plot ... well ... the film has so many issues that I guess that plot is the least of them. There's a cave somewhere in America (I assume) and in this cave there's an ancient shrine (built from modern-ish bricks and mortar) and in the shrine is a relic - which looks like a carved statue (a relic is usually a piece of a saintly or important person rather than a stone statue), and protecting the relic are a bunch of demonic people with skull faces and large spears and blades, led by some alien demon creature thing with glowing red eyes which makes a sound like the Predator ...
Anyway, into this cave (which seems to have many ways to approach it depending on how much time the director wants to spend in people getting there) comes archaeologist John, looking for the relic. Well one of his partners is killed by the demons (after falling down a very slight incline and breaking his ankle - it's just not believable) and John just escapes, but then driving back home to his wife (Jeri Ryan) he has a heart attack at the wheel and crashes the car into a tree (at about 1 mile an hour - it's the least convincing car accident I've ever seen).
He's rushed to hospital and Ryan joins him there where the doctors struggle to save his life while the operating theatre fills with demons watching and the like ... He's saved, but then they go to get their kids from college and they're there kissing boys and trading drugs - you know, like you do at college - and they all leave as John has decided they're all going back to the cave to get the relic as John's dad (Shatner) has threatened to kill John if he doesn't - nice guy. But then the demons show up and start slaughtering people at the college who John interacted with ...
But they didn't come for his wife ... or the doctors ... or his dad ... strange.
Anyway, they all head off back to the cave, and this time they need a boat to get there and it takes ages and ages ... they arrive only to be attacked by the demons again who kill everyone except John. Except they don't, and they let John leave with the relic which he destroys, and then Shat says they need to go back to the cave to rescue the family who are still there, so they do this, but are impeded by a group of people who were burying the guy who died at the start so the demons come and kill all those people ... the family is rescued from the cave but Shat blows it and himself up trapping all the demons underground ... or has he ... or is John still on the operating table ...
It's an absolute, unqualified mess of a film which makes no sense, has terrible performances from just about everyone (the only character I believed was the daughter (Ciara Hanna) who must have been wondering how she got involved in this total car crash of a film.) and really has no redeeming features at all.
In the end I was watching it more for the laughs as it got more and more ridiculous and things happened just because ... but it's not a film I want to watch again, and is so poor that everyone involved really ought to hang their heads in shame,
And then they come to release it and so are desperate, hence the fairly decent promo images and plot write up ...
It's a waste of time for everyone - the people who made it, who star in it and who watch it. Avoid like the plague!
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