Review Written by Kevin Scott, MoreHorror.com
It’s really weird to watch something from the era of your formidable years as a young horror fan that you didn’t seen back then. It’s a little liberating in a way. The rose colored glasses of sweet, sweet nostalgia come off, and instead of reminding you of that first trip to the movies to see something that wasn’t animated and didn’t have muppets in it, everything just looks dated as all get out.
Before I really get into The Keep, just let me say that this was directed by Michael “Miami Vice” Mann. Who would later go on not only to make the five o’clock shadow fashionable, but make some really good films after that. I read that he disowned this film. That always saddens me a bit when I hear it. For two reasons. For somebody out there, that film means the world. They have had every incarnation of it from Beta to Blu Ray, and maybe even went to the dark side and got a bootleg copy if it wasn’t available through mainstream avenues. Also, that film that the filmmaker despises may have been instrumental, in varying degrees to where they are now and the success, fame, and money they enjoy. Whether it was skills learned during production or an important person that they met while filming along the way, every step is important. So I humbly and respectfully say to the filmmakers, please don’t disown your films. Just sign the fan’s piece of memorabilia at the horror con, and grin and bear it. They deserve the courtesy.
The plot of “The Keep” is really pretty cool. World War II German soldiers take control of an unconventional structure in the mountains of Romania. The structure is a “keep”, something that is intended not as a fortress to keep everyone out, but as a carefully designed prison to keep something otherworldly in. The first wave of German soldiers are led by Klaus Woermann (Jurgen Prochnow). A civilized soldier that ask questions first, and shoots later. He does however completely disregard the warning from the keep caretaker about what not to do. There are several silver crosses that adorn the inside of the walls, and they go way past just being ornamental. When one is removed, and ancient demon is set free. Now, I did say that this was a World War II movie, so I’ve got to have some evil Nazis, and we do. They show up a little after the first group of German soldiers, and like Nazis do, bully people and are generally nasty warmongers. The most nasty of them all is the Nazi commander Eric Kaempffer (Gabriel Byrne). Just to make the cocktail a little more volatile, let’s throw in a Jewish historian, Dr. Theodore Cuza (Sir Ian McKellen) and his daughter, Eva (Alberta Watson) to decipher the writings on the keep walls.
While soldiers are being killed by a supernatural force, tensions run high. The demon foils an attempt by German soldiers to rape Eva and it also heals her father, whose health has been failing fast recently. With his restored health, Dr. Cuza becomes a
pawn in helping the demon attempt to get an artifact past the keep walls to the outside to give it complete freedom. This is a nice touch, and adds a little ambiguousness to the morality of it all. Is the demon going to be so bad when compared to Hitler?
I haven’t talked about Glaeken Trismegestus (Scott Glenn). Maybe an angel, maybe an alien, really too hard to tell. He has a cosmic link to all the crazy stuff going on at the keep, and gets there as soon as he can. This was perfect casting as Scott Glenn has a unique look about him. He’s one of the few actors out there that can look muscularly emaciated, if that makes any sense. He seems to be the absolute only hope out there that can put the evil back in its cage.
I wasn’t really impressed by this film, but I didn’t hate it. I love the 1980’s but the Tangerine Dream score with all the synth music did not do any favors for all the World War II imagery. The plot is so promising and with Nazis notorious for trying to harness the occult as a weapon, it naturally goes together. I would love to see a remake with a more hellish demons, and maybe some melting or possessed Nazis. The original film is obscure enough that it wouldn’t cause the remake to suffer by comparison, and maybe the original might get a little more love as well.