The Mothman Prophecies

Reviewed by:
Eric Alt

The Mothman Prophecies tells the tale of a small boy who, after witnessing his parents’ brutal murder, dedicates his life to fighting crime as the nocturnal dark knight of vengeance—The Mothman! OK, not really. But doesn’t that sound better than “based on the mysterious urban legend and the strange events surrounding Point Pleasant, West Virigina”?

Starting with the assumption that most people are familiar with the Mothman legend (he’s right up there with Bigfoot, The Loch Ness Monster, and Axl Rose—a weird creature few have seen but who is believed to be some sort of omen or supernatural entity), The Mothman Prophecies tells the story of a grieving widower (Richard Gere) who begins to suspect that his wife’s death has some connection to sightings of a tall, winged thing with glowing red eyes in and around West Virginia. While not a completely bad movie, it never really gets moving the way it wants to and it belabors the few points it’s trying to make. The movie is pretty stylish, but too often the flourishes feel more like padding—if it were chopped down a bit, it would make a pretty good X-Files episode.

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