Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

Excellent but underrated film

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Acting is good, not great. Good music. Cinematography is good, not great. There were a few good scenes, the helicopter blade chopping the head off the leader, Kirk's nightmare. Besides that the killings were nothing special at all. The story was OK, but nothing too exciting. The ending sucked. I wouldn't call it an Omen ripoff, but it has similar themes. It had all the elements to be a good B movie. But everything just seemed to just go nowhere. Probably worth checking out once. I give this movie a C, or 6 starts for attempt at a B movie, but it's really a decent C movie.Acting is good, not great. Good music. Cinematography is good, not great. There were a few good scenes, the helicopter blade chopping the head off the leader, Kirk's nightmare. Besides that the killings were nothing special at all. The story was OK, but nothing too exciting. The ending sucked. I wouldn't call it an Omen ripoff, but it has similar themes. It had all the elements to be a good B movie. But everything just seemed to just go nowhere. Probably worth checking out once. I give this movie a C, or 6 starts for attempt at a B movie, but it's really a decent C movie.

Holocaust 2000 is directed by Alberto De Martino and co-written by Martino and Sergio Donati. It stars Kirk Douglas, Simon Ward, Agostina Belli, Anthony Quayle and Virginia McKenna. Music is by Ennio Morricone and cinematography by Erico Menczer.Nuclear industrialist Robert Caine (Douglas) refuses to heed warnings that the Antichrist is closer to home than he ever could have imagined...Caine and AngelCasting aside the fact that it is a cash in on the success of the far superior The Omen, it simply isn't smart or good enough to make its own mark. Knowing what is going on in the first instance is not a great thing for the audience, it would be were the narrative strong enough to keep us on our toes, but it never is. The plot speeds along merrily following the same trajectory as expected; mysterious deaths, pregnancy, loads of ominous warnings, repeat sequence of doom and on to the unsubtle reveal in preparation for a less than satisfying ending.The makers do try to add some salt to the satanic broth, such as having Douglas roam around naked in a feverish nightmare, and some moments are kinda fun in that tacky Italian/England production way, but the zip, the originality, is sorely lacking. Cast seem to be working off of a different screenplay to each other, though Douglas is at least working hard to make the duff regurgitation come alive. It looks nice on occasions, and it's fun for the wrong reasons, but its low standing reputation is fully justified and therefore near impossible to recommend to anyone but Kirk Douglas completists. 5/10

Holocaust 2000 represents two things. It is the director's attempt to cash in on the huge success of The Omen. It is also Kirk Douglas's attempt to get a wider, younger audience back on his side by flirting with the horror genre.The film is a mess, with Douglas playing the unsuspecting father whose business plans for a thermonuclear plant in the Middle East are enormously unpopular. His son, Simon Ward (a real Michael Caine lookalike in this film), is his closest ally when it comes to trying to build the plant, but what Douglas hasn't figured out is that his son is the embodiment of the AntiChrist, and that he only wants it built so that he can destroy mankind. Various people get killed (especially anyone who stands in the way of the plot) before Douglas figures it all out, but by then everyone thinks he is mad and he can't stop the completion of the plant. However, he does manage to escape and thus lives to fight another day.The film never pushes the audience out of their comfort zone. It poses no thought provoking questions, no ominous atmosphere, and no originality. The performances are surprisingly good considering that the material is so poor. A couple of the killings are well filmed, especially the colonel who is beheaded by a helicopter rotor blade, but some of them are a bit unconvincing. The film's one sex scene is quite erotic (surprisingly so considering the age gap between Douglas and his co-star Agostina Belli) but that hardly makes it worth watching. All in all, this is a missed opportunity.

The end is near! Citizens protest! Worldwide panic spreads across the globe! A nuclear holocaust threatens us all! The monstrous beast will rise from the ocean to consume all life! Earth will become a scorched wasteland!Who ought to care about why the hell this movie punctuates so much on the Apocalypse? The Italians certainly had been ashamed of making this film in the first place! Even our priests who run the churches would be in for a mass uproar about the falsity this delivers. But heck, this is the movies!Words cannot describe this sordid, terrible drama, acting more of a drunken Shakespearean play about nuclear fear than anything else. A poor planning in developing a good story and lousy writing makes this the perfect glass of sour milk. One of our best well-known movie stars, Kirk Douglas, has a few embarrassing performances, one of which is when he stands out naked in front of visions of rising monsters from the ocean. Also, it makes a failed attempt at showing off any suspenseful magic about the supernatural. Either it is Douglas who thinks the Great Flood has come, or just a coincidence of Mother Nature rising the ocean tide.The movie actually gets a further beating on trying to be a meaningless horror / splatter film, which wants to show off uselessly. HOLOCAUST 2000 is good if you want to see Kirk Douglas star in a movie so horrifying in its pitiful execution and directing skills. What does this movie want to be when it fouls up? A DOOMSDAY BOMB!