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Director
John Frankenheimer
Year
1979
Country
USA
Runtime
102 min

Also released as

  • Prophecy: The Monster Movie
  • プロフェシー/恐怖の予言
  • 怪兆

Prophecy

Prophecy is a 1979 American creature feature directed by John Frankenheimer.

Mercury poisoning produces a mutant bear in the Maine woods, and it is angrier about logging than most activists.

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A public health doctor investigates a dispute between a paper mill and the local Native American community and finds the river is poisoning everything, including a bear that is now enormous and wrong.

John Frankenheimer, who made The Manchurian Candidate, directed it as a straight-faced environmental horror film, and the seriousness is part of the appeal: the mercury politics are real and detailed, and then there is a skinned monster bear tearing through a campsite.

The sleeping-bag sequence, in which a child in a bag is swatted against a rock and explodes in feathers, is the most famous thing in it and is startling.

It flopped and was mocked, and the ecological argument it makes about industrial mercury poisoning is entirely accurate and was based on the real Minamata disaster.

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Trailer

The sleeves

The same film, sold as a different film in each territory. Click any of them.

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