Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

People are voting emotionally.

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Cassie Grant is a young American traveling on foot in England who gets hit by a car. The driver invites her to stay at her large estate with her husband, an art historian researching a recently-uncovered church nearby. Cassie's apparent amnesia gives way to disturbing visions related to the church, and a group of individuals in the village who seem to have sinister motives.This early-2000s supernatural horror romp has been on my radar for years, but it took over a decade before I actually sat down to watch it. It feels very much like a product of its time-the early 2000s, when supernatural thrillers of this sort were very much en vogue. What's unfortunate about "The Gathering" is that it is conceptually a very intriguing film with an engaging premise. As much as it is by-the-numbers, the narrative did draw me in.Where the film falters is its tonal inconsistencies and pacing. The cinematography is quite gorgeous, with the English locales vividly captured with atmosperhic flair, but there is a choppiness to the proceedings that give it the feel of a made-for-TV movie. I have read that it was truncated, so it is possible that there is a fuller cut of the film somewhere, but the released version feels like it has missing components that would have developed the character relationships a bit better.Christina Ricci is solid as always, though her performance does feel floppy at times, and there is some dialogue that comes off contrived. Ioan Gruffudd plays the tall, dark & handsome stranger/quasi-love interest and is serviceable. Stephen Dillane and Kerry Fox are quite good as the husband and wife who take in the American traveler.In the end, "The Gathering" is a mildly fun popcorn horror movie that could have been much more than it was. Whether the result of sloppy writing or sloppy editing, it feels underdeveloped, and that is its main problem. If you enjoy by-the-numbers supernatural thrillers, though, it is quite entertaining. 6/10.

***SPOILERS*** Far out movie involving some dozen person who were present at Jesus' Crucifixion who like someone rushing to an accident were there to get entertained not to feel any sorrow for the man suffering on the cross. As were told these heartless individuals were dammed to roam the earth forever to observe tragedies, like floods earthquakes wars and assassination, until the end of time. The latest tragedy that the dozen were slated to observe was the little English town of Ashley Wake's car mechanic known as "Crazy Fred" Argyle,Peter MacNamara,flip his lid and go on a killing spree gunning down everyone in town who abused him. That's when "Crazy Fred" was a little boy at the town's Catholic Church's orphanage where he was repeatedly gang raped by a number of townspeople that included the priest in charge!It's American tourist Cassie Grant, Christina Ricci, who by losing her memory in her getting hit by a car while hitch hiking to town who in fact saves the day by stopping "Crazy Fred", who after he murdered some half dozen people, from doing far more damage or killing then he already did.***SPOILER*** It in fact was Cassie who was one of the dozen or so people who were part of the gathering at Jesus' Crucifixion who were there to entertain themselves who in the end stopped all this carnage from happening at the cost of her own life!Along the way Cassie got friendly with the Kirkman's whom Marion Kirkman, Kerry Fox, hit her with her car that caused Cassie to lose her memory. It's in Cassie losing her memory that in the end made her a better person by eliminating the guilt complex she had in what she was involved in some 2,000 years ago in her insensitivity towards Jesus' Crucifixion.***SPOILERS*** Interesting up to a point but halfway through the film gets so confusing that those who are there to observe the impending tragedy, of "Crazy Fred" going nuts, actually start participating in it like the clean cut and charming local homeboy Dan Blakely,Ioan Gruffudd. It's Dan who goes out of his way and does some murdering on his own. As for Cassie she in the end gets rewarded for her good deed in saving young Michael Krikman's, Harry Forrester, life whom "Crazy Fred" who had it in for him in feeling that Michael was the reincarnation of the Catholic Priest who was responsible in molesting him when he was 12 years old!

Christina Ricci stars as an American, Cassie, who is hit by a car belonging to the wife of a art restorer(...and investigator), Simon Kirkman(Stephen Dillane)who is currently working on a top-secret project regarding the restoration of a first century church buried under earth. This church, Simon discovers, was built by Joseph of Arimathea and features the faces of a gathering of on lookers who came to the crucifixion to simply watch out of idle curiosity. It is believed that the gathering were condemned(..by God?)to wander the centuries, forced to watch the same kind of horrifying acts of violence to victims as they had during Christ's crucifixion. Something in the town of Ashby Wake is going to happen and Cassie, who can not remember much about her past, has terrible premonitions regarding certain citizens suffering brutal fates. Cassie has taken to Simon's quiet son, Michael(Harry Forrester), almost mute thanks to the death of his beloved mother, and, after seeing a premonition of his own demise, sets out to stop the future act with the best of her ability. A rather imposing local mechanic, Argyle(Peter McNamara), Cassie discovers, was molested by his priest and certain drunken citizens as a child, and she believes he will be behind something seriously sinister, hoping to stop him before he carries it out. She meets a likable chap who lives nearby(..he tells her)named Dan(Ioan Gruffudd)and Cassie opens up to him about her troubling premonitions and he seems supportive, but is he really an avenger for her cause? And, how come Cassie escaped being seriously hurt after the car hit her to begin with? Can she save Michael and stop Argyle? To be honest I found the premise totally silly and couldn't take it seriously. But, it is a well-made thriller that builds over time, filling in the blanks, using Ricci as our guide, along with the priest(Simon Russell Beale) who makes some startling discoveries regarding familiar faces which show up during several various places "to watch" horrifying deaths calculated by a supreme being who forces the gathering to forever wander in time. The film, for a while, has two alternating stories, the restoration of Joseph's church and Cassie's attempts to stop a potential disaster, with them intersecting when the faces of the gathering become better known. But, for a long period of time, director Brian Gilbert and writer Anthony Horowitz maintain a heavy level of ambiguity, providing clues using premonitions, ominous faces, past memories detailing a disturbing truth which fuels the violent rampage at the end, and a heroine with several mysteries of her own which slowly unravel as the disturbing event draws near. The themes of fate and redemption are explored and Ricci's Cassie, through her amnesia, can perhaps change an event that's set to happen, unlike the gatherers who merely await in the background to watch it all unfold. It's quite an odd concept I found rather hard to swallow, but I'm pretty sure many will find it to be thought-provoking and intriguing. Like BLESS THE CHILD, not one of Christina Ricci's better known films, but might be entertaining for fans of spiritual thrillers.

This contains spoilers so do not read if you actually plan on watching this terrible, terrible film.Not often do I see a movie where I get more and more angry the longer I watch. The idiocy of the plot, the fact that all those that "gathered" to watch Christ die were all Caucasians, the secret church that has nothing to do with the plot at all, the gathering ghosts that are there to just "watch" but actually end up killing several people (Why? Are they Satanic now? There is no reason!), the forced message about second chances when the step-mom was just shot dead, this movie is terrible!You cannot (cannot!) photo-shop a swastika on the Statue of Liberty and use the concept to make a shocking thriller about how it's actually a secret Nazi missile silo, just like you cannot use JFK footage to try and convince an audience that the ghost of Caucasian Christ haters were at the assassination of Kennedy. But wait, this movie did just that!Ricci is as bad an actor as Reid in my book (yes, that bad) after watching this monstrosity. I feel like scratching the disc so no one else at Blockbuster will have the misfortune of sitting though this "exclusive."Do not see this movie, ever!