An English family of six takes in a pregnant woman who disappears shortly after giving birth. They raise the baby girl as their own, but over the years the strange deaths of their children make them consider whether the little girl is more than she appears.
Similar titles
You May Also Like
Reviews
Save your money for something good and enjoyable
There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.
The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.
It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.
This bleak, nihilistic film is obviously inspired heavily by THE OMEN - and yet remains a far more horrifying picture. This is due to the fact that the victims in this film are all innocent children who get savagely killed, deaths which will upset even the hardest viewer. While it's not a particularly well-made picture in any respect (i.e. the low budget is quite often apparent), the film achieves what it sets out to do, to horrify the viewer, and thus it gets my thumbs up.The lack of big-name stars helps to add to the realism in THE GODSEND. The central characters are played by unknowns, and the only familiar face will be Angela Pleasence in a cameo. Pleasence plays an exceedingly creepy woman who acts as a catalyst for the murders, and is the most disturbing thing in this film. Stoddard and Hayman are very good as the anxious parents, who eventually split up under the pressure; Stoddard is a likable central figure, while Hayman excels as the woman who suffers a nervous breakdown through circumstances she just can't comprehend.The murders are kept off screen (apart from a nasty moment where a child is thrown from a window), leaving our imaginations to play a big part. Each breaks down the parent's mental state further. The little blonde girl is very good in it, too. THE GODSEND is a little-seen, little-heard of film, but for viewers who like to be creeped out (and not through gallons of gore, either), then it deserves some tracking down.
A strange pregnant woman (a memorable and quietly sinister performance by Donald Pleasence's daughter Angela) shows up unexpectedly at a country cottage owned by a young couple with four kids. The woman gives birth to a daughter and then promptly vanishes. The couple decide to raise the girl Bonnie (ably played to the supremely creepy hilt by Joanne Boorman and Wilhelmina Green) as if she was their own, only to have Bonnie grow up to be an evil brat who starts bumping off her other siblings. Director Gabrielle Beaumont, working from a bold and compact script by Olaf Pooley, relates the compellingly twisted story at a hypnotically gradual pace, does an ace job of crafting a grim and unsettling atmosphere, grounds the fantastic premise in a believable workaday reality, and makes nice use of the beautiful bucolic locations. Moreover, Beaumont warrants extra praise for handling the dark and upsetting subject matter in a tasteful and restrained, yet still effective and disturbing manner as well as for using a low-key approach that puts a noted emphasis on an eerie and subtly unnerving mood over cheap shocks and graphic gore. Malcolm Stoddard and Cyd Hayman are solid and credible as the concerned and increasingly distraught parents, with sturdy support from Patrick Barr as friendly physician Dr. Collins. Norman Warwick's sharp cinematography offers several stunning panoramic shots of the breathtaking British countryside. Roger Webb's robust shuddery score hits the spine-tingling spot. This picture acquires an extra chilling sting from its intriguing ambiguity (for example, we never find out exactly why Bonnie is so wicked). Worth a watch.
The film is absolutely dreadful. I had to watch it with the fast forward button. This film succeeds at doing only 2 things...it makes you want to beat up the stranger and the evil girl. The film is full of empty spaces...it could have been over in 20 minutes. Avoid this film!
This movie is not connected to, a rip off of or inspired by The Omen. Just because both happen to be about an evil child doesn't mean a thing. The Godsend is pure science fiction: what if there was a sub-species of humans who bred the same way the cuckoo does. This bird has the nasty habit of laying it's eggs in the nests of birds of other species. The baby cuckoo imitates the calls of its nestmates so the unwilling adoptive parents are none the wiser. At its first opportunity the baby cuckoo murders the other babies by pushing them out of the nest. That's what this movie was about.