Wonderful character development!

Fresh and Exciting

Absolutely Fantastic

For having a relatively low budget, the film's style and overall art direction are immensely impressive.

Sister Marguerite is convinced that the events of the Revelation is occurring but her superiors would rather ignore it. An anonymous woman calls LA police detective Russell Logan (Lou Diamond Phillips) with a tip on a serial killer. His team catches serial killer Patrick Channing (Jeff Kober) who is eventually put to death. The mysterious woman had warned against the death penalty. Channing's spirit lives on and is killing Logan's team one at a time. Tess Seaton (Tracy Griffith) reveals herself to be the psychic who called him with the tips.This is filled with the leftovers of a supernatural serial killer thriller. It doesn't have much in the way of originality or surprises. The style is pretty bland and Lou Diamond Phillips is second rate as the action lead. Tracy Griffith is a pretty woman but not a great actress. The beginning is tied up with an uninvolving serial killer case. It would probably be better to leave most of it as flashbacks. It needs to get the movie to the cop and the psychic much faster. It does have some fun with a supernatural killer and the movie keeps me somewhat interested. If it commits more fully with the Jason-like killer, this could be a better horror and a more exciting thriller. The horror effects are more cheesy than scary. It does have one good sequence in the middle.

Before I go into an explanation of this movie, I will discuss the belief system behind this movie. Basically it comes from the ancient Persian religion of Xorastrianism. Some people still follow this religion (such as the late Freddy Mercury) and it is focused around two gods, a good god and an evil god. These two gods are of equal power and are at constant war with each other. Some people believe that Christianity evolved out of this religion, but it did not. More likely this religion evolved out of Judaism. The reason I say this is because Satan is nowhere near as powerful as God, and even though he has a immense amount of influence in this world, he cannot do anything without God's say so. Job 1&2 show us how Satan has to get God's permission to inflict suffering onto Job, and even then God tells Satan how much he is allowed to do. Has God go the right to do that? Well if we read the book of Job through we learn that through his suffering, Job is strengthened in his faith, and the blessings he receives at the end far outweighs anything that could have happened to him. Some say God is not powerful and is not in control because of the suffering that occurs in this world, but the truth is that a lot (but not all) of the world's suffering is because of us, humanity.Anyway, the theology behind the First Power is that God and Satan are of equal powers and give gifts to people to do their will. Satan's power in the world is growing but the church does not want to get involved. He has given a man, Channing, the power of possession. He is killing people in the city of Los Angeles in the form of a Pentegram, but a Psychic, Tess Seaton, can see it. A cop, Russell, is pursing Channing and captures him with the help of Tess, on the condition that he does not receive the death penalty. Russell ignores this and Channing is executed. Because of his power, Channing returns in spirit form and can possess people. If the body is killed then he can possess somebody else. He is practically immortal, and now he is after Russell and Tess.This movie is good as an action movie, but there are a lot of flaws in its logic. It claims that Channing is seeking the power of resurrection to gain immortality, but because he can possess people he does not need to be resurrected. He can gain fleshly pleasures where ever he goes anyway. It claims that Jesus has all three powers, but Jesus may have been able to tell the future and he rose from the dead, but he never possessed anybody. It also assumes that Jesus was a man blessed with powers by God, when Jesus was in fact God himself.The psychology of the film is interesting because Channing constantly plays with Russell and Tess. He is very powerful as is and gets into his victim's minds and twists what they see. He can alter what they see so even though he is possessing a body, he can alter what his victims see so they don't know who he is possessing at the time. What is really impressive about Channing is that way he constantly mocks and plays with his victims. He is not insane, he is just corrupt with power and he knows that he cannot be killed. And the people he possesses are practically dead anyway.Even though there are some flaws in the movie, I do like it. The ending leaves you wondering whether he is dead or not, as we know that he was killed before and he came back. Russell and Tess are forced to the edge of sanity and begin to wonder what is happening. Russell begins to question his faith again, while Tess finds herself unnerved and thrust into Russell's arms. At first they fight, but when Channing's power is fully realised, they realise that they need each other. Especially when Tess fortels Russel's death. This is a decent movie, it is a shame that it only appears on at midnight.

When childhood memory tells you this was a scary movie; it's touch and go whether you should revisit it. Anyway, I remembered a scary scene involving a homeless person and a cool villain played by Jeff Kober."The First Power" is not a very good movie, sad to say. It's chock full of those cop clichés and a very poor script with holes a truck could drive through (along with countless convenient "twists" that help the story run along). Lou Diamond Phillips is the over-confident bad ass cop who sends baddie serial killer Kober to the gas chamber only to find out he was a minion of Satan himself and now has the power of resurrection along with the power of possessing every weak minded person who he comes across. Through in the mix a very poorly realized psychic who helps with the case.Ahhh, this is trash. But enjoyable as such, especially if you have fond memories of it. It scared me as a kid and that scene with the homeless person is still pretty good. As for any kind of logic here; forget it, just about every scenario is thrown in for good measure and you end up with a cross between a Steven Segal action flick and a 70's demonic flick. And who on earth thought it was a good idea to cast Lou Diamond Phillips in the lead here? Needless to say he's not convincing at all but he tries his best and I've never had the problem with the guy so many reviewers here seem to have. As for Tracy Griffith as the psychic, the less said the better. But Kober is pretty good as the killer; always liked that actor."The First Power" may be just what the doctor ordered after a hard day's work and a "brain switch-off" is needed. Beer will most likely enhance the viewing experience and I'll definitely have loads of it the next time I give this movie a spin. All in all; not a good flick but a somewhat guilty pleasure for nostalgic fans who were easily scared as kids. "See you around, buddy boy"!

The only thing that The First Power really has going for it is that it affords Jeff Kober an opportunity to play one of his lovely variety of psychotic villains that he's done so well in the last 25 years. Kober is a worthy successor to Lyle Bettger who specialized in those parts back in the Fifties.But it's not enough, The First Power is a souped up slasher flick that has Lou Diamond Phillips wasted as an LAPD detective who has a specialty in catching serial killers. Kober is his latest catch, but Kober's in league with a lower power and they're going to team up and make Lou's life miserable for him. Even after Kober is given the gas chamber, his spirit comes back in all kinds of guises.Mykelti Williamson is on hand as Lou's partner who meets a nasty end involving a demon possessed horse and Tracy Griffith as a psychic and Elizabeth Arlen as a nun with insights are around to help Lou. Will he succeed in battling forces from beyond?By the time the film ends, you no longer care. Lou really got trapped in a turkey. Maybe the devil made him do this film.