The Covenant

Watching The Covenant makes one wonder just how far has director Renny Harlin fell. Only 16 years ago, he was riding high helming anticipated summer blockbusters like Die Hard 2. A couple expensive flops later, one of which nearly bankrupted its studio (Cutthroat Island), and he's been reduced to putting his name on Z-grade teen supernatural schlock like this that would be hard pressed to find an audience as a made-for-TV movie on the Sci-Fi Channel, let alone the big screen. The Covenant is an often ludicrous, and sometimes incoherent, film that doesn't even try to build any thrills with its premise, opting instead to concentrate on squeezing in as many shots of its young model cast wearing nothing but their underwear (or other revealing clothes) as it can. If this film isn't laughed right off the screen by audiences its opening weekend, nothing is sacred.

The film's background story centers around various families that held great supernatural powers, and were forced to go into hiding when the Witch Trials came along. Today, these families are represented by four teenage guys who carry on the tradition, and hold all the personality and looks of the blandest boy band you could possibly imagine. There's the pouty-lipped unofficial leader of the group Caleb (Steven Strait), his close friend Pogue (Taylor Kitsch), bratty young rebel Reid (Toby Hemingway), and some guy named Tyler (Chace Crawford) whom the screenplay forgets to give anything even resembling a personality, nor do I think he had more than three lines in the entire movie. The movie tells us they have great supernatural powers, and when they turn 18, they will reach their full potential. Unfortunately, they must use their power sparingly, as if they use it too much, they will age prematurely and shrivel up into something that kind of looks like the Emperor from the Star Wars Trilogy. (And since our cast is made up entirely out of male underwear models, this would be bad.) Caleb is set to turn 18 soon, and is trying to keep his group under control, but some of them just can't help but use their powers to play pranks on others, lift up womens' skirts in bars, and fix cars.

The four guys go to a private school where the entire student body seems to be made up of them, two hot girls, a bunch of extras who only show up in classroom scenes, and one other mysterious guy named Chase Collins (Sebastian Stand). It seems that Chase is a member of a mysterious fifth family that holds the same powers as our four friends, and has come to steal their powers. He starts out with subtle ways to get our heros' attention, such as having ghoulish zombie-like creatures called Darklings suddenly pop up in front of the faces of the teens, but soon turns to more drastic measures when he starts casting spells on their girlfriends. Chase wants group leader Caleb to hand over his power to him when he turns 18 in a couple days, or else he will kill his pretty blonde girlfriend. Will Caleb give in? Will you even care when you see how inept this movie is for yourself?

The Covenant is a movie that surrounds itself in spooky atmosphere, but doesn't even try to even frighten or thrill us. The private high school these kids attend seems to have been inspired by the design of Dracula's Castle. The skies are constantly overcast, and there's a thunderstorm in literally every night time scene. Caleb lives in a giant, dark gothic mansion with his booze hound mom that looks like something Batman would call home, or maybe have the Phantom of the Opera lurking somewhere in the many dark corners of the kid's brooding abode. Every street corner holds an abandoned barn or spooky old mansion that has some kind of connection to the kids' supernatural past. All these spooky places, and director Harlin can't think of a darn thing to do with them, except have the actors stand in front or inside of them, and deliver laughably dialogue. (Try to keep a straight face when the villain Chase starts reciting the children's nursery rhyme, Little Miss Muffet, in a menacing and growling tone in what is supposed to be a threatening taunt.) The movie is a slow, plodding teen drama with supernatural undertones that hardly show their face, except for an anti-climactic final battle where Caleb and Chase do nothing but throw transparent balls of energy at each other over and over.

It hasn't been long since my showing got out, and I'm still trying to figure out just what this movie was supposed to be about. There's no real conflict till well after the one hour mark. Until then, we have the four teens yelling about whether or not it's right to use their powers, and have them dancing or hanging out while loud music blasts on the soundtrack. Of course, it would help if the movie bothered to explain a lot of the stuff it throws at us. For example, throughout the film, Caleb is haunted by a "Darkling", which is supposed to be a demonic ghoul of a dead student who was murdered by Chase, and has now been sent after our heroes. Actually, that last sentence is my best guess, as the movie never explains just what exactly a Darkling is, what it does, or what it has to do with anything in this movie. It pops up, screams at Caleb, disappears, and then he desperately calls his friends and says, "Someone just sent a Darkling after me", while the audience is left staring at the screen in dumb befuddlement as to what the hoo-hey is going on. From unexplained plot developments, to characters so underdeveloped they're not even there, The Covenant reads like the first draft of a screenplay that was written after an all night drinking binge. Then the writer tried to make sense out of the jumbled words he left in his alcohol-fueled state, but didn't succeed.

To add even more insult to injury, the film has gathered up one of the blandest and most untalented group of teen actors ever assembled. All of the actors were obviously hired for looks rather than acting ability, as the cast on screen shows no visible sign of talent whatsoever. I'm not saying this to be mean, I seriously have not seen more wooden or unconvincing actors gathered together in one movie. That Screen Gems felt this worthy of a theatrical release is mind-boggling. The girls in this movie are gigging sex toys who exist simply to lust after the guys, and the guys are there to strut around in underwear and swimsuits, revealing clothes, swat each other playfully on the behind with rolled up towels, and in a bizarre and out of the blue scene, kiss each other on the lips. Nothing makes sense in this movie, not one single solitary frame of film. The only enjoyment you will find if you are unfortunate enough to watch The Covenant is laughing at the hilariously bad dialogue, and the accompanying bad acting.

If you're a fan of bad movies, or like to add your own commentary to bad movies Mystery Science Theater-style, The Covenant will most likely fulfill your every need. All others are well advised to stay away. Looking back on this review, I've found it impossible to describe in words just how ill-conceived and downright wrong this movie is. The next time you've had a lousy day, and just feel like you can't do anything right, just remember there are people who are far worse off than you, and they all worked on The Covenant.

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