‘Til death do us part? Not if Eric has anything to say about it.
The brooding man never knew love or affection his entire life—not from his parents, not from any romantic partner and certainly not from the abusive guards at the secluded criminal rehabilitation center in which he resided.
But then Eric met Shelly. She arrived at rehab when a couple police officers caught her with a purse full of drugs. And then, it was inevitable. Shelly couldn’t help but be charmed by Eric’s brooding darkness, and Eric couldn’t help but fall for Shelly’s affection.
It didn’t take long before the two escaped rehab together: When some wicked people from Shelly’s own dark past came searching for her there, the couple fled into the night. And for some time after that, their lives were carefree and full of nothing but affection for each other.
But then those wicked pursuers finally caught up. They mercilessly choked the two to death. Movie over.
Except, not quite. Eric wakes up in a strange in-between realm and meets a curious man. The crows which surround the man are meant to take Eric’s soul to the afterlife, but the man tells Eric that he can’t get there due to the burden his soul carries. What’s more, his beloved Shelly’s currently sinking her way down to a permanent stay in hell.
But it’s not too late, the man tells Eric. The not-quite-dead man can still make things right. He’ll be allowed to return to life, and if he can slay every person involved in his and Shelly’s deaths, then he’ll bring Shelly back to life.
Eric quickly finds himself back in his body in the land of the living, face-to-face with a corrupt cop looking to clean up the scene.
Bang! Eric’s shot. But to both his and the cop’s surprise, Eric doesn’t die.
Oh yeah, the mysterious man between worlds mentioned one more thing: so long as Eric’s love for Shelly remains pure, he’s functionally immortal.
A couple people help or warn Eric, and one pays the ultimate price for his support.
In a strange way, The Crow confirms the evil nature of the devil and compels us to resist him.
[Spoiler Warning] Eric argues with a supernatural creature, explaining that he’s willing to take Shelly’s place in hell in exchange for another chance to save her. And even when the creature tells Eric that, if he doesn’t sacrifice himself, his own eternity would actually be easy-going, Eric still desires to take her place to redeem her.
When Eric dies, he wakes up in a sort-of foggy train station in between worlds. While there, he meets a strange man along with a large murder of crows. The man tells him that people once believed crows carried souls to the realm of the dead, but souls carrying terrible burdens wouldn’t be able to find rest. The crows then “guide you to make the wrong things right.” When Eric asks if the man is an angel, he laughs at the notion. Though it’s never made clear exactly what he is, the man does imply that he’s not in charge, referencing that a decision isn’t ultimately up to him.
When Eric is sent back to the land of the living to enact his revenge, he’s not only given immortality (as long as his love stays pure). He’ll have, he’s told, “the power of a god.”
Of course, the antagonist of the film has been dabbling in the supernatural himself. We’re told early on that he made a deal with the devil for eternal life so long as he sends innocent people to hell in his place. He’s likewise been granted an ability to speak curses into the ears of people that compel them to do evil things—primarily, murdering others or killing themselves. Furthermore, he apparently extends his life by cutting his hand to suck up his victims’ blood and life force through their injuries.
Shelly says that a drug’s name is “Lamb of God.”
[Spoiler Warning] Black tendrils and clawed hands drag a man to hell.
Eric and Shelly have sex, and we see the sensual movements and noises. In terms of nudity, we see Eric’s rear twice, and we see a drawing of a woman with her breasts visible. Shelly is seen in revealing underwear once and is otherwise noticeably braless whenever she wears any additional clothes. When the two aren’t having sex, they’re passionately kissing, whether that be at the nightclub, their apartment or elsewhere. The two take a bath together, though we don’t see anything.
The Crow revels in its gore and bloodshed, even surpassing, at times, gore-heavy films such as Saw. While the 1994 release was by no means free of brutal deaths, this new release amps the gruesome nature of those deaths up considerably.
A couple people are decapitated, and a couple men lose their arms. Dozens of men are shot, stabbed, choked, drowned or otherwise beaten to death in a variety of blood-and-gut-spewing ways. One man’s jaw is split open when a sword is forced into his mouth. Others have their eyes pierced by blades, and one man’s neck is snapped when Eric stomps it into the steps of a staircase. Someone’s head gets smashed in. Eric and Shelly are choked to death with plastic bags in a distressing scene. It’s implied people burned to death.
And even though Eric is immortal following his return from the grave, that doesn’t make his injuries any less graphic. He takes hundreds of bullets to the body, and he’s also stabbed. He’s pushed from a speeding car, and he’s run over by other cars. In many of these instances, his bones are visibly broken or sticking out from his body, and he’s forced to painfully push them back inside himself before his supernatural healing occurs. (The fact is made even more painful by the knowledge that, though he cannot die, he can feel every injury.)
A couple people are compelled to commit suicide: one brutally stabs herself in the neck multiple times, while another jumps from a high building and smashes against the concrete. Shelly asks Eric if he’d be willing to commit suicide with her were she to ever jump from a bridge, and he says he would.
Eric finds a horse bleeding heavily after getting tangled in barbed wire. After he rips the wire from the horse’s body, it dies.
The f-word is used nearly 55 times, and the s-word is used six times. God’s name is used in vain twice, and Jesus’ name is likewise used in vain once. Someone is called a “wh-re.” Someone displays his middle finger.
Eric and Shelly smoke marijuana and take ecstasy together. Shelly is taken to rehab after various drugs are found in her purse. A childhood home seems plagued with parental drug abuse, and we see a rehabilitation center. People smoke cigarettes and drink alcohol.
A woman is drugged and kidnapped.
None.
I wasn’t that big of a fan of the original 1994 version of The Crow when I reviewed it. But having seen this 2024 adaptation of the source material, I much prefer the older one.
Filmmaking’s broodiest hero since Batman returns to theaters, set to slay every person involved in his and his girlfriend’s deaths. And though he’s clad in black, the supernatural vigilante will be covered in red by the end of the film.
Whereas the original started moments after their brutal slaying, this release focuses longer on the romantic, often erotic relationship between Eric and Shelly. I suppose the thought is that, when audiences see the passion the two have for each other, they’ll feel something of the same heartbreak Eric soaks in throughout the rest of the movie when their inevitable murders happen.
This is the film’s weak point, however, since the two have absolutely no chemistry—unless you think a montage of kissing and sex constitutes it. In fact, neither are very compelling as characters. Shelly simply doesn’t have a personality, which is marginally better than Eric, whose personality consists of a brooding pick-me boy so upset by the death of his favorite horse that he’s gotten part of H. P. Lovecraft’s Despair poem tattooed on his back (and I wish I was making that up).
Failing the love angle, The Crow’s other focus is in trying to amp up the violence of the original release. And if success in that category is measured in pints of blood, well, this one wins by a landslide. Some moments are graphically gory, and many deaths will garner as much cringing as some of the dialogue does.
Kennedy Unthank studied journalism at the University of Missouri. He knew he wanted to write for a living when he won a contest for “best fantasy story” while in the 4th grade. What he didn’t know at the time, however, was that he was the only person to submit a story. Regardless, the seed was planted. Kennedy collects and plays board games in his free time, and he loves to talk about biblical apologetics. He thinks the ending of Lost “wasn’t that bad.”
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