Of course I watch The Gate regularly, and have even seen The Gate 2 a couple times, but I never got a hold of parts 3-8, so it’s hard to draw connections here. Depp wears glasses throughout, so I assume he’s the Glasses character from the first two movies (Louis Tripp), continuing to investigate demonic texts, sent from “New York” to Europe by Frank Langella to authenticate a satanic book.
Whenever Depp finds new information or studies a new copy of the book, somebody ends up dead and something ends up missing, but he gains a floaty guardian angel in Emmanuelle Seigner and persists. The movie is all talk for eighty minutes until she floats down a staircase and karates a would-be thief – not that I’m complaining because it’s also a rare classy film about ancient books in an otherwise low-rent Shocktober.
Depp into trouble:
The best scene is this Spanish guy playing twins:
After we’ve lost Bookseller Bernie (a Depp buddy from Donnie Brasco to Public Enemies) and devilbook owner Fargas (of Pieces) and the probably-evil Baroness (Weisz’s mom in The Deep Blue Sea), Langella thinks he’s obtained all the devil’s power, and stupidly tries to prove his invincibility by setting himself on fire. After he burns up, Depp carries on his mission, and maybe the world ends, I dunno. This was the same year as Sleepy Hollow and The Astronaut’s Wife, the year he slipped from interesting actor to movie star.
