Priest

2011

Action / Adventure / Crime / Fantasy / Horror / Mystery / Sci-Fi / Thriller

163
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 46% · 96 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Spilled 46% · 50K ratings
IMDb Rating 5.7/10 10 128857 128.9K

vampire hunter vampire dystopia post-apocalyptic future crucifixion vampire hunter (slayer)

Plot summary

In an alternate world, humanity and vampires have warred for centuries. After the last Vampire War, the veteran Warrior Priest lives in obscurity with other humans inside one of the Church's walled cities. When the Priest's niece is kidnapped by vampires, the Priest breaks his vows to hunt them down. He is accompanied by the niece's boyfriend, who is a wasteland sheriff, and a former Warrior Priestess.

Director

Scott Stewart Photo
Scott Stewart

Top cast

Henry Kingi Jr. Photo
Henry Kingi Jr. as Bold Priest
Karl Urban Photo
Karl Urban as Black Hat
Reiner Schöne Photo
Reiner Schöne as Minister
Mädchen Amick Photo
Mädchen Amick as Shannon Pace
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay 3D.BluRay
656.79 MB
1280*534
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 27 min
Seeds 12
1.34 GB
1920*800
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 27 min
Seeds 65
1.50 GB
1920*1080
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 27 min
Seeds ...

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by fewald139 7 / 10

Stakes on a Train

Priest was recommended to me by my late brother, whose love of vampires was only second to his love of gothic fashion. Inspired by a graphic novel series of the same name which was itself inspired by the fantastic video game Blood (1997), Priest is a glorious mix of fantasy/sci-fi/western themes and environments with just enough corniness to make the average graphic novel fan or gamer settle in with popcorn and have a good time.Paul Bettany plays Priest, utilizing a wonderful Western-esque American accent and looking fine as Mr. Tall, Blonde, and Broody. He lives in a religiously-themed authoritarian city reminiscent of the walled cities in Attack on Titan, where the only thing darker and stinkier than the gritty streets is the Order he has dedicated his life to, led by the always-talented Christopher Plummer. When word gets to him that a family member is in peril after a vampire attack, he rebels against his Order's wishes and goes on a mission to save her, picking up two companions along the way.Priest starts out a little slow at first before we get insight into Bettany's character, but once he flees the city the film is a feast for the eyes if you love dark, gritty environments. There are also a few bright, post-apocalyptic vistas here, with giant deserts and canyons, fallen city husks, and giant, worn religious monuments. The action scenes stretch the boundaries of realism at times, but always in a fun "Wait, he did WHAT?" kind of way rather than a distraction. Priest has a variety of weapons, gadgets, and moves at his disposal, though Priestess (played by Maggie Q) has the honor of executing the best kill of the movie in its climax. How they must have cleaned up the scene to keep the movie PG-13!Speaking of the rating: though low on gore, Priest never felt particularly tame or stunted due to its low rating. The more gore and giblets the merrier, but its absence wasn't missed here, aided in part by the film's overall dark tone. Other reviews lament Priest's lack of gripping story; I never had a problem with its straightforward nature, though I liked the movie enough to wish for further films in the franchise (at this point, unlikely).Some high points of Priest for me: Karl Urban, who intrigues me in everything he does, brings out his inner sass to play the wonderfully intimidating Black Hat. The vampires (save for Black Hat) are creatures, not sensual humans with funny accents, which is my favorite rendition of the myth that is rarely done in modern media. Brad Dourif (Chucky from Child's Play) has a fun bit role as a sleazy salesman. And lastly...vampires are cool, but what's even better? Trains. That's right, folks, the climax features one determined steampunk-esque locomotive, and that just lit a spark in my little girl heart.I understand why many don't consider Priest one of their favorite movies, but its low score baffles me. There are things Priest could have done better, sure. There are deeper stories to be told in this unique and interesting universe. But Priest was never offensively bad or even mediocre, and as a fan of both video games and graphic novels, it provided something special for me. To my brother: I'm sorry I didn't watch this before you passed, but you were right about Priest. I really liked it.
Reviewed by kannibalcorpsegrinder 9 / 10

Fun and highly enjoyable effort

After learning of his daughter's abduction by a gang of vicious vampires, a priest defies the local clergy and sets out with several friends to stop her while also running across the slew of creatures attempting to enact the vampires' far more deadly plan in the process.For the most part, this one was far better than it had any right to be. One of the film's best features is its absolutely great pace for the most part here as it's basically like an Action film in how it plays out with all sorts of scenes featuring them out hunting in the wasteland hunting, stalking and combating all the various creatures. By basically engaging in fighting with the various vampires all the time all over the place, this makes for some good times in offering some exciting sequences from the first big brawl in the desert compound where the vampiric creatures begin crawling out of the underground pit and begin acrobatically jumping around to avoid the battle to a stellar confrontation in their underground hive with the monstrous pet creature along the pit where the two of them team up to bring the creature down. Other great action scenes, from the attack on the workers on the outskirts of town to the surprisingly fun rampage through town with a lot of fun attacks and battles going on off to the sidelines of the scene which lets this one get really exciting. That builds up into the finale on the train which gets really exciting here with the desert bike chases, the brawling on the train and all the different individual battles with the vampires left alive make for some frantic and rather exciting setups which end the film on a high-note. That these elements are so much a huge part of this one, along with the design of the creatures and a higher body count than expected which all boosted this considerably. While these make for a much-better-than-expected effort, it does have some big flaws since this started off on a sour note with the hampering rating and a far more vicious and brutal comic-book style animation than what would be shown in the movie proper to open the film. Beyond that, the film's biggest issue is that the vampire lead is pretty much non-existent and not much of a threat since this one deals more on them chasing him down so his plot is a little underdeveloped and really seems shoehorned into the proceedings to keep the film going despite being somewhat clever in concept. He's somewhat weak in general as there's not a whole lot of scenes here featuring him to get his plan out and there's just a few moments to really learn his powers so overall he rates pretty low overall here. The only other issue here is the rather blatant and obvious CGI that is featured throughout here, which really manages to stick out quite heavily with the creatures and the high-energy action scenes which all look quite symptomatic of the overly CGI make-up that's featured here. Otherwise, there's not a whole lot else wrong here.Rated PG-13: Violence and Language.
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