Wonderful Movie

Memorable, crazy movie

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

During a routine case in Los Angeles, New York private investigator Harry D'Amour (Scott Bakula) stumbles over members of a fanatic cult, who are waiting for the resurrection of their leader Nix.Even with popular films like this and "Nightbreed", Clive barker will always be known as the creator of "Hellraiser". I am sure that does not bother him much, especially so long as the checks keep coming in. But this movie shows he is more than just a guy who writes about torture and Hell.Is it magic? Illusion? Or something more? It seems like the perfect subject for a movie and to have a cult devoted to such things. While we know that magic is all a trick, what if it was more than that? What if it was a direct channel to the supernatural, something divine or evil?

Earlier this year, 2015, actor Daniel von Bargen died. He was only 64. While I had seen many of his movies and some TV roles, I had never seen this movie, "Lord of Illusions." An IMDb member recommended that I see it. So I found a nice used DVD of the movie and now own it.The title and references in the movie distinguish between "magic" that is performed with illusions and "magic" that is real, perhaps black magic of the evil spirits or the devil. It centers on a cult in the desert and the movie opens with scenes representing 1982. The cult leader is Daniel von Bargen as Dix, and it is clear that the magic he performs are not illusions. He is shot and killed by a young girl.Forward to 13 years later, 1995 which is the release year of this movie, and a detective stumbles upon some old evidence and a magician who was part of that cult 13 years earlier. The girl has grown up into a beautiful woman, being hunted by evil members of the old cult. My only reason for getting this movie was to see von Bargen's performance, and it is a very good one. In fact now it would be hard to imagine anyone else in that role. I knew him in college, we were students at Purdue, and we were in a 4-week, 28-performance student musical in 1969. It is both extremely fun and extremely sad to see him on screen, knowing that he is already gone.SPOILERS: In 1995 they found someone who could tell where Dix had been buried, and dug him up. He became "re-animated", of course still evil and uttering the words "I was born to murder the world." But in a series of events he was propelled down a deep shaft into what looks like molten lava and apparently destroyed. But who really knows? As the director comments in the DVD's selectable director's commentary. Good horror movie.

Long story: Years ago, mid-Nineties, I saw bits of a movie at a friend's house after opting not to videotape it back home. It turned out to be better than I expected, and now, years later, I'm trying to find it. Problem is, I don't know the name of the movie. Or the actors.So why bother the fans of LORD OF ILLUSIONS? It clearly isn't this movie as I downloaded the trailer last night. But what I do remember of the target I'm searching for is (1) character name Swann (2) bad guy had a mandrill in a cage, a young girl in a cage, he intimated that he was going to put the girl in the cage with this horny creature (3) mind-bending powers of bad guy...You're all screaming this is LORD OF ILLUSIONS. I insist that it is not. I saw your movie trailer last night, and Scott Bakula doesn't ring a bell, and I'm RavenGlamDVDCollector, Famke GOLDENEYE Janssen would have rung a bell.The movie I saw was on South African pay-channel M-Net during the mid-Nineties, which places it in the same era as your movie. MAJOR POINT HERE: TV Trope & Idioms site refers to the movie's maniac monkey as a mandrill. From the flash of it seen in the downloaded trailer, THAT IS NOT A MANDRILL. Movie I'm talking about featured a big, hulking male mandrill with that 'war-painted horrible face', not the little fun thing from FRIENDS and CALIFORNICATION gone momentarily berserk.Identifying it hinges on the mentioned key scene: Does your LORD OF ILLUSIONS feature a despicable guy threatening to put a captive girl in a cage with an adult male mandrill (with for all practical purposes is a rainbow-faced baboon, very intimidating)And if I have just been wasting your time, kindly note that SOMEWHERE OUT THERE IS A MOVIE VERY SIMILAR IN KEY STRUCTURE, perhaps inspired by Clive Barker's work. Or am I 'barking' up the wrong tree? [email protected] eagerly awaits your response. Please enlighten me with any comments and clues.

Hired to protect a widow, a private detective learns of her husband's work in the supernatural when his instructor, the leader of a black-magic cult awakens and seeks his vengeance upon them for their past work against him.This turned out to be a massive disappointment due to the fact that there's just not a whole lot here to like. One of the few good elements is the traditional use of an obscure atmosphere and occult imaginings that are just really creepy and chilling as they tamper with themes they have no business doing so with. As well, the search for the leader's writings and hiding place make for some pretty interesting times and the finale in the decrepit halls of his sanctuary and the full use of the black magic is a lot of fun. The main problem here with the film is the fact that it's just far too long and really takes far too much to get going as there's just so many useless scenes that add unnecessary time to the proceedings that there's no real use in featuring them, which include the scenes of them in the magic club, the following home from the funeral and the numerous failed attempts on his life that make the cult seem wholly incompetent to risk that kind of exposure that often with so many failed attempts. As well, the special effects are wholly terrible with primitive CGI that looks laughable and totally unconvincing, a villain with a changing conquest plan that makes no sense and a really thin story that's never fleshed out. These here drag it down quite a bit.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language and Brief Nudity.