Honourable Mention: Evil Angel

This 2009 film, directed by Richard Dutcher, came to my attention because Amazon UK recommended it to me. Looking at the film’s page customers, (six of them) had tagged the film as being a vampire movie. It isn’t but I’d like to think that they did that as it is based on the Lilith myth and were aware of the mythological associations between Lilith and vampires. The truth is more likely that Lilith, in this, can produce an horrific face with fangs.

However, there were a couple of references within that touched upon the genre and there is that mythological connection with vampires. Indeed I gave an honourable mention to the Lilith based film Night Angel due solely to that mythological connection. Lilith is in the film Umbrage and is shown as the source of vampirism. Similarly the vampires in the film Blood Ties are said to be a race descended from Lilith rather than Eve (as humans are).

needs a makeover

This again features Lilith as a character in a film that runs at almost two hours in length. It features two separate stories that intertwine and these both run from the head of the film. During the credits we see a woman rubbing herself sensually as Goodnight Sweetheart plays. As the credits end her face becomes fanged and demonic. Cut to a man who falls backwards in fear, though he is on the street rather than in the scene we have been watching. The woman before him looks perplexed.

So here we have to explain that Lilith is a spirit and much later she is described as a hopper. She can hop into a body and take it over for a few seconds. Full possession is more difficult and tends to occur when someone dies and then are brought back – Lilith slips in pushing the original soul out. So, whilst an ambulance rushes to a call, the man is hounded by Lilith who is making short term hops, until he is on a rooftop, clinging to a giant neon cross and she makes him plummet to his death.

Kristopher Shepard as Marcus

The ambulance is staffed by Marcus (Kristopher Shepard) and Jen (Marie Westbrook, Dracula’s Curse). They get to a flat and deliver a baby . Once they get mother and child to the hospital Marcus is back out with another paramedic called Shawn (Desean Terry) and end up at a stabbing of a girl called Emma (Rachel Emmers). Marcus thinks he recognises her, though they have never met, and certainly there seems to be a connection between them in the ambulance – then she dies. He is so upset he pushes the doctor out of the way, after he has called the death, and tries to continue resuscitation. He almost gets in disciplinary trouble for that.

Caroline is possessed

Elsewhere in the hospital a woman called Caroline (JJ Neward) suddenly awakens and pulls her wires and tubes out – yes, she has been permanently possessed by Lilith. She goes into a supply cupboard, where a maintenance man is proposing to a nurse, takes them both down with a fire extinguisher and steals the woman’s clothes. She calmly walks out of the hospital. Meanwhile Marcus goes home and finds his wife, Carla (Ava Gaudet), having sex with another man. After he smashes the family pictures he leaves.

Vic is dead

The next day he is in a disciplinary hearing with regards a previous call where a prostitute died under his care. The board decide that whilst there seems to be no blame that could be attached to his actions, he will be suspended without pay until there has been an independent investigation by Carruthers (Ving Rhames), a private eye. He works with his son Vic (Lamont Stephens) and this is the second story as Vic knew the man who died at the beginning, and the prostitute who died was Lilith who was blackmailing his friend. Lilith kills Vic early on in the film.

suicide via Nosferatu

So, I mentioned some other vampire connections – beyond the Lilith myth. The first one is around Carla who is a self-harmer. It seems, for the most part, she does it for attention. She cuts herself early on and later takes an overdose but is careful to phone Marcus first. Later still she is taking a bath, watching Nosferatu on a TV perched above the bath. She has reason, that I won’t spoil, to self-harm again and uses a bathrobe tie to pull the TV into the bath with her. To a degree you could say that Graf Orlock kills her! However she is revived… guess who is inside? Your guess will be correct but Marcus falls for the lie she offers and thinks she is now Emma.

hanging about

The other vampire connection concerns advice given to Marcus by his ex-partner and paranoid mystic Martineau (Richard Dutcher). After giving him silver bullets dipped in holy water he also suggests a method of killing that includes shooting her, ramming a stake through the heart, cutting her head off, shoving garlic in her mouth and burying her one hundred feet deep; just to be sure, you understand. Much of this, of course, is familiar to the vampire film fan and, in context of the film, pointless. Anything that will kill a human will kill the body Lilith is in and she will just find a new one.

Lilith has drunk her Red Bull 

I should mention that, at the film’s finale, Lilith sprouts a pair of wings that could be said to be bat like or devilish depending on which way out you feel. All in all I rather liked this. The story was complex enough and, despite being two hours on, didn’t drag. The joining of the two stories was a little clunky perhaps and I am sure I could pick holes if I tried. But for what it was it proved entertaining. A mention here then due to the focus on Lilith and the genre references that were clearly deliberate.

The imdb page is here.