trashgang Well well well, a straight to video with lets say, some really well known names in the UK like Nick Brimble. But somehow this low budget fails to deliver us evil. The acting is okay but the script fails to make it creepy or atrocious. I was never scared watching it, you can see the killings done by Dylan, the devil's child, coming from take one. As a child he almost kills a child, later on he kills others but it just don't work. It's a pity because they could have made more out of it, there is no gore or bloody scene's, almost no effects, it's done in an off screen way. You see it coming, the they cut away, and blood splatters all around. But what takes the movie down is the way they made it, a complete rip off of The Omen. And to get it worser, when they have a birthday party for Dylan they have to be masked and guess what, nudity just like in Eyes Wide Shut. And we can go on, something to watch on a Sunday afternoon with some scones and afternoon tea....

slayrrr666 "The Calling" is a really dull and lifeless horror film.**SPOILERS**Recovering in a Church hospital, Kristie St. Clair, (Laura Harris) reveals how her romance with journalist Marc, (David Lintern) soon transferred into marriage. When son Dylan, (Alex Roe) is born, both are extremely happy about becoming parents. When he gets into late childhood, he suddenly starts acting weird, while her husband backs up his every move. Constantly being told that she has a connection with the birth of the Jesus, she ignores them even though the weird events surrounding her start to tell her otherwise. When she is finally confronted with the news that her child has been taken in by a demonic cult which hopes to use him for the birthing of the Antichrist, she races to find a way to get him away from the followers of the cult.The Good News: This here wasn't all that terrific, but did have a few good moments. This is almost solely relegated to individual scenes to make it interesting. Only a handful are really good, mostly because they are the ones where something happens. The biggest involves the method of dealing with the child at the beach. This is quite a fun scene as it gets interesting and gives a few really nice moments. There's others spread out through the film, including the conversation in the car and the birthday party celebration that get quite entertaining, but only the funeral scene comes close to the beach moment. This is one of the best scenes in the film, and ends the film on a great note since it's just as action-packed and chilling as anything that came before. This here really makes the film watchable.The Bad News: This here has a couple of really big flaws. One of the big ones is the film doesn't do anything. There are large portions of the film where nothing happens and it gets old and dull quite easily. Watching those kinds of scenes doesn't inspire fear at all, since all it does is just stand around with each other talking about the situation. That doesn't bode well for generating excitement or suspense, which is another problem. This here doesn't have much of any suspense in it, and this is due to two key things. Part of it is due to the fact that it's only attempts to do something interesting are explained rather than shown. The dog attack should've been one, but as done in the film, it's explained afterward. This happens far too often in the film, and that makes for some really dull viewing amidst the missed opportunities. Another part is that the film hardly ever goes for horror on-screen. The real moments where it tries to get to be a horror film are beset by the fact that it will cut away before anything can happen, and in turn not even being granted much in the way of aftermath violence makes it feel like a really weak horror film. The last flaw is the sheer predictability of the film. This one plays out just about every trick in the book and hits them out to the letter. This makes the film feel like every other horror film like this since it does nothing new, and that can really hurt a film. These here all really lower the film.The Final Verdict: Not a whole lot of time spent on the horror and too many flaws makes this one a really dull experience. Really only see this one if looking to complete a night of a similarly-theme viewing, but there's far better ones out there in this genre to make this one seem special or important in any way.Rated R: Violence, Language, mild animal torture and a mild, non-explicit sex scene

sol ***SPOILERS*** Another "Omen" clone with the Antichrist coming back to earth to usher in the year 2000. At the beginning of the movie "The Calling" we see Kristie St. Clair, Laura Harris, being chased into the sea by a group of black-clad Satanist and then shot. In the hospital Kristie under intensive care is attended by her priest Father Mullin, Peter Waddington, whom she tell her story, as we go into flashback, about the string of events that ended up almost costing her life.Being married to top Isle of Man TV news commentator Marc St. Clair, Richard Lintern,Kristie's life could never be more happier until she gave birth to her son Dylan, Alex Roe. On the very day that Dylan was born Marc's station's manager Jack Plummer, John Standing, and his wife's Elizabeth (Alice Krige)seven year old son Sammy, Liam Hess, disappeared. Found some time later Sammy had his heart cut out in some kind of gruesome Satanic ritual but the story was kept from the public by news-reporter Marc; it was reported that Sammy was strangled.It becomes obvious that young Dylan is some how connected with Sammy's murder in that the dead boy's parents Jack & Elizabeth become his surrogate parents. It's as if they in some way traded in Sammy for him! Growing up Dylan get's influenced by both the Plummers and his father Marc in the black arts which includes the unchristian rites of Satanism like reading backwards as they do with passages of the Bible in some of their secret rituals.Kristie's friend Lynette, Camilla Puner, about the only person in the movie, besides Kristie, who isn't a Satanist later interrupts an ungodly act preformed on young Dylan by his father Marc and Elizabeth which later cost Lynette her life. Dylan in a mocking of the crucifixion was himself crucified by Marc & Elizabeth , but lived to tell about it, upside down!"The Calling" get's very confusing with it's attempt to show how powerful the grip of Satan is on the people of the Isle of White by over doing a number of wild crazy and ungodly scenes. There's a drunken sex orgy, where this dirty old man get's electrocuted in a Jacuzzi, that Kristie secretly attends. Earlier a woman, for what seemed like no reason at all, jumps from a tower and lands on top of Kristie's car almost killing her and Dylan who was with her at the time. There's also the weirdo cab driver Carmac, Francis McGee, who's some kind of religious nut popping up in scene after scene and giving Kristie, and the audience, the straight dope to what's really happening on the screen. You sense right away that this Carmac knows a lot more then what he's saying and as the movie moves to it's predictable conclusion you start to realize that he does a lot more then drive a taxi for a living in fact he drives almost the entire cast of the movie into a wild and hysterical frenzy in the films end-of-the-world-like final scene.Even though nowhere near as effective as "The Omen" the film "The Calling" has the same eerie and disturbing look to it, in fact it's one of the most shocking and unnerving TV movies that I've ever seen. The ending of the movie like in "The Omen" leaves you with a bad feeling in your heart and mind in that there's no way in stopping Satan, or the Devil, from doing his evil deeds on earth. Even the priest Father Mullin get's so disturbed by what he sees that he just rips off his collar and throws it away.The movie ends almost crying for a sequel, like in The Omen, but now some six years later that sequel has yet came to pass; maybe it's because the movie was such a flop in the box office that it wasn't worth, for it's financiers, in making one.

HK Erickson This film was extremely low budget. At one point we noticed the boom (microphone) dip down onto the screen during a scene in the church. Laura Harris has proved herself a good actress in other films, but this one does not do her justice. Also, the story becomes sketchy at the end and is slightly underdeveloped. There were several moments in the movie where I found myself asking, why are they doing this? And thats not such a bad thing, if they're explained. But they never are. See it if you're into religious, cult type movies, but even then you really might not enjoy it much. As far as the editing and special effects go, this movie is also very lacking. But to be honest, I have seen worse low-budget films. So if you're into this type of movie, go ahead and give it a try. But consider yourself warned.