Gabriel DVD Review

Quick Stats
Produced by - Shane Abbess
Anna Cridland
Kristy Vernon
Written By - Shane Abbess
Matt Hylton Todd
Directed By - Shane Abbess


Cast
Andy Whitfield
Dwaine Stevenson
Samantha Noble
Michael Piccirlli
Jack Campbell
Matt Hylton Todd


Overview / Spoilers

“Fall from grace”, the tagline for my DVD purchase this week from the Australian movie “Gabriel”. The movie had an Australian release and is now being distributed by Sony Pictures Entertainment all over the world on DVD and as far as I can find it was not released theatrically anywhere except down under.

The movie follows Gabriel, oddly enough, in the fight of light against dark, the battle for our souls, yes another movie fighting a secret war of light and dark. I was warned that this movie was a Day and Night Watch rip-off however I feel it has its own solid ground to stand on. The story is of purgatory, souls who are neither damned nor saved, they are in the middle of eternity waiting for a home. There is a balance of power between the darkness and the Arch Angels who are constantly monitoring the souls of the trashed city, all the while fighting over control of the souls. The story was something along the lines of (I’m trying but the sound was not all that great and many of the sound effects blocked out dialogue parts) God sends an arch angel to assume human form and take his role in the war of the souls, however once that arch angel fails another one is sent. I was kicked out of my catholic school, but I believe they’re seven arch angels; I’m not 100% sure due to the fact I was forced to leave for making out in the bathroom homecoming night.

After all the other angels before him fail to mount an offensive strike strong enough to take out the leader of the dark forces Sammael, Gabriel is clipped of his wings and sent down as a human to battle the fallen. He soon finds other arch angels who have been injured who warn him of the task that will soon follow. However, we soon see that Gabriel is a character who will not listen to the arch angels who have battled the fallen, he just keeps rambling on about how he was taught by Michael, the strongest of the arch angels so he knows he has the ability to fight the fallen to avenge the arch angels.

As the story digs deeper we learn that Michael has gone missing, his power had arrived on the ground and grew weaker every day, none of the arch angels can account for what happen, they assume only the worse as Sammael and his fallen have taken them out as well. Gabriel is concerned about Michael as they are like brothers, or father in son in the sense that Michael was his teacher. Gabriel goes around healing the arch angels he comes across despite being told he will only hinder his own powers. One of the arch angels that he comes across is Amitiel, who (for those who don’t know) is the assassin of the arch angel stories. However after her confrontation with Sammael has been given a choice, one that will haunt her forever. She may either be killed which in purgatory if one dies their souls die, thus no after life, OR she may fall from grace and loose her wings. For fear of permanent death Amitiel opted for the fall from grace and is now being forced to sell herself under the name of Jade.
Gabriel finds her and an instance love sparks between them (or it may have been there before I couldn’t tell over how the arguing was, the acting wasn’t so much bad, as it was just hard to decipher) after they both calm down and get their heads straight. After a sex scene between two angels, a statement that would make all my former teachers at John Twenty Third literally shit their pants, Gabriel must defeat all of the fallen to weaken the powers of their leader Sammael.

One by one Gabriel takes out the fallen’s forces, one when he was hunting for Jade, and the rest through campaigns of war. Despite having been weakened by both fights and healing his fallen brothers, Gabriel finally goes forward to take on the evil one himself, Sammael. Before the fight takes place Gabriel finds that all of his brothers that he had saved who were hiding out just trying to get by and do what they can, have been murdered in an attempt to weaken Gabriel and win the war. Jade looks on from a window out onto the dark and rainy city as the final battle for lost souls takes place. It is here where we learn that Sammael is actually the arch angel Michael, who has been killing his kin, his brothers, for power. Michael claims he did it all for Gabriel, so that he wouldn’t have to fight or live by God’s will, that in human form they could rule over all the souls and do as they wish. Gabriel will hear nothing of this and the battle continues with Gabriel getting a led pipe shoved through his midsection. All seems lost for us lost souls until Gabriel thrusts himself into Michael stabbing him with that very same led pipe in his torso. The two fall to the ground and with one last act of regret, Michael uses what is left of his power and energy to heal Gabriel before both of them die forever. Gabriel cannot take this, knowing that he had to kill Michael in order to save the souls of everyone in the city. Gabriel decides that he must now take a fall from grace while at the same time, killing his soul forever as he jumps from the top of the building where he and Michael were battling.

My Thoughts

Though it is very low budget, the fighting did its job considering I only paid three bucks for this DVD, it was not terrible. Gabriel however was on the long side reading over two hours for a plot that WILL work I’m sure, but just doesn’t come out here. The sound quality makes hearing certain scenes near impossible and in a movie of gritty violence and sex, there is much more dialogue than anything, or at least until the last 40 minutes or so. However if you have some free time and there is nothing else to do, I suggest watching Gabriel because the story alone is great, the writers took an age old story of arch angels and the fallen, mixed in SOME action, and did alright considering the very low budget and resources.