Very disappointing...

Thanks for the memories!

Captivating movie !

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Just a flat out bad movie.Awful acting and effects, and the stupid demon guy grunting and screaming just wasn't very scary. Very Low budget spent mostly on interesting shots of the Pacific Ocean and fake clouds, not very well thought out plot either because the time frame was just all messed up,awful pacing problems, too many shots of people sleeping cutting out of the story, the worst scene in the whole movie was the scene where the girl was running away from nothing and fell into a clearly fake spiderweb, with the camera spinning around in circles for no reason and then she tripped of a cliff. And the scene where Richard pretended to be an attractive demon and tried to seduce Scot was also a very bad piece of film making.NOT VERY GOOD ONE OF THE WORST 1/10

Since a movie has to be fairly interesting to keep me interested for several hours, I'll grant it a 7.So far, most of the comments I have heard about this movie have been negative. However, having seen it in light of a more recent movie, The Skeleton Key, which I liked, I see a key thing that these movies have in common - they both delve into areas of life that we tend to shy away from or ignore. I didn't think either of these movies were particularly scary, but I wouldn't watch these movies looking for a scare. I would watch these movies for their interesting portrayal of the dark arts of life. While traditional horror movies create their own monsters, make up crazy rules for which a person will die, or just prey on childhood fears and ghost stories, movies like this attempt to create a glimpse into a more real form of horror. Every day some people believe in these dark beliefs, practice these dark religions, and perform these terrible rituals - these are the very people we like to pretend do not exist. Movies like this force us to look at our world and see that there are dark things going on around us and actually hiding in our shadows. This is perhaps the "real" horror story that we should be embracing rather than the cheap chills, willies, and screams that Hollywood sells us.Secondly, I think the story of the "ghost chaser" serves as a warning of what it takes to fight the supernatural and the evil dark arts. One had better be prepared for all situations and be able to recognize evil from every angle, or else one could easily become a pawn of evil at the same time as one believes he is fighting it (e.g. see the last line of the movie - ask yourself what might have happened if he 'didn't know it'). Fighting dark evil is not for the feint of heart or the ill-prepared.Perhaps the script kept true to the story to a fault. Maybe there should have been some more cool special affects, more music-induced tension, more ghosts jumping out at you, or even more research into realistic satanic rituals. However, I think the director did pretty good with what he had to work with.7 out of 10. Thank you.

This whole movie is about a haunted Bed & Breakfast that is actually some kind of gateway to Hell. You know, come to think of it, I think I actually stayed there once. You can read my review of it on Travelocity. Sorry, the joke was there and I took it.I read somewhere that Black Gate was originally called The Darkening and was made back in 1996. Now, if someone told me that it was made in 1986, I might say it was a decent effort. If it had been made in 1976, I would have said it was amazing. But since it was made in 1996, I can't really excuse the horrible CG that looks like it was done on somebody's Atari 500 game console. I can't really excuse the fact that the hero wears a ridiculous trenchcoat through the whole movie, and I can't excuse the flimsy plot.I guess the owner of the B&B wants to get rid of the ghosts, because they're making all of her guests leave. In comes a pair of ghost hunters, a trenchcoat wearing priest and his sidekick. At some point, the sidekick winds up falling in love with one of the ghosts, which leaves the whole "saving the B&B" thing to Father Trenchcoat.It's not really worth describing the story in greater detail. There's a lot of Father Trenchcoat trying his best to act like Max Von Sydow in the EXORCIST. He winds up being drawn into a portal which sends him to CG Hell. It's where all of the Bad CG goes to die, and Father Trenchcoat gets dumped right in the middle of it. He fights his way home and fires his agent for getting him put in this stupid movie to begin with.

Black Gate (aka The Darkening) is one of two thematically similar films I just watched back to back (the other being Devil's Harvest, 2003) that owe a strong debt to the classic "seaside haunted house films", ala Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca (1940), Lewis Allen's The Uninvited (1944) and Joseph L. Mankiewicz' The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947). They both mix a lot of semi-Satanic mythology with their relatively more hyperactive, modernized styles. Unfortunately, although Black Gate has promise, and there are positive elements, this was the bad film of the two, ending up with a 6, the equivalent of a "D" letter grade for me.Rebecca Lacey (Rebecca Kyler Downs--her character's name seems like it should be an homage to Hitchcock's Rebecca, but as that's her real name, too, it might just be a coincidence) owns a struggling Bed & Breakfast on the California coast. It's struggling because it's haunted. Rebecca can barely get guests to stay for a few hours. As the film opens, we see an elderly couple experiencing poltergeist-like events, including a face stretching out of the wall similar to the famous poster/DVD cover art of Peter Jackson's The Frighteners (1996). They run out, never to be seen again.Rebecca then calls in Scott Griffin (Jeff Rector) and his photographer assistant Justin Reid (George Saunders). Griffin is a self-styled "ghost chaser" who has written a book entitled Unknown Realms: A Psychic's View of Hauntings. Rebecca hopes he can solve her problem. While staying at the Bed & Breakfast, exploring and experiencing some events more typical of a haunting, Griffin comes across some occult items, including a box that's a gateway to a hell dimension--the titular Black Gate.The chief problem with Black Gate seems to be the script by John Jones and Victoria Parker. That was disappointing to me, because although this may have been Parker's first film, Jones had previously penned Amityville 4 (aka Amityville: The Evil Escapes, 1989), which I loved, and Amityville 6 (aka Amityville 1992: It's About Time), which I haven't seen for some time, but I remember liking.Here, the backstory is far too convoluted, which saps it of impact, and there are far too many non-sequiturs, such as the ridiculous romance that blossoms between Justin, who is a committed skeptic, and a female ghost, Katherine (Red Montgomery). The story lacks a definite arc--it feels more like a set of arbitrary events. The script is short, and the dénouement is way too long, but the ending is also somewhat abrupt and inexplicable. Additionally, the "ghost buster" functions of Scott and Justin are laughably shallow and amateurish, especially in light of the activities of groups like The Atlantic Paranormal Society (TAPS), as portrayed in the excellent Sci-Fi Channel show "Ghost Hunters" (2004). Admittedly, some of these problems may have been due to director William Mesa (who has an extensive, impressive background in visual effects with his company Flash Film Works), but they seem like flaws in the script to me.But Black Gate also has a number of admirable elements. The basic gist of the story has potential. Especially by referencing films like Rebecca and The Amityville Horror (1979), the groundwork for an effective haunted house flick is already extant, and the occult background material could have been intriguing. The performances aren't bad considering what the cast had to work with. Downs and Lyndis Durwin, as Maggie Stewart, were actually good, although Durwin doesn't have a very big part. There are some nice external shots of the sea, and I loved the surrealistic artificiality of the establishing shots of the house--Mesa created nice composite shots of the house with computer generated skies and geographic features in the background--but those are few and far between. However, the interiors left much to be desired, with their plain, stark white walls reflecting the blandness of the events that transpire. The cinematography is decent to good, but the extremely low budget that Mesa apparently had to work with does not allow him to excel at his niche--special effects. The effects in the film tend to have all the panache and impact of the average ghost scene on a weekday afternoon soap opera, which unfortunately carries over to the atmosphere of the film at large.