professor | Around the World in 80s Movies Podcast

The diary of a reclusive priest named Father Carlton reveals a centuries-old secret sect in the Church called the Brotherhood of Sleep. Carlton was on the verge of revealing their existence to the Archbishop that Brotherhood is guarding an ancient cylinder filled green fluid hidden in the basement of an abandoned 16th Century-built chapel in Los Angeles. The dormant entity inside the cylinder has been awakened by the force of a distant supernova that exploded long ago, a chaotic chain reaction disrupting order on Earth.

Another priest discovers the diary and key to the basement, encountering the cylinder and a mysterious book written in ancient languages containing mathematical and physics references. The priest contacts his former TV debate sparring partner, advanced physics professor Howard Birack, to decipher what it all means. Birack brings a research team of graduate students to investigate, who collectively experience tachyon transmissions in their dreams from the future warning about the re-emergence of an ancient evil.

The book reveals the truth: Jesus was a descendant of a human-like extraterrestrial race killed for delivering scientific warnings that no one understood. His disciples hid these warnings until such a time when science could catch up and decode the truth. The church lied publicly, telling followers that evil lies within them and could be controlled through faith.

Meanwhile, the Prince of Darkness, aka the Devil, has remained dormant in the cylinder there for two-thousand years, placed there by his father, the Anti-God. The anti-God once roamed the Earth before humankind’s existence but now resides within subatomic antimatter awaiting a time for his son to reemerge to help him cross from the mirror dimension into the material world.

Something’s growing in the prebiotic fluid, leaking up toward the ceiling, squirting into the mouths of the students, using psychokinetic energy to turn them evil. Satan’s searching for a host to bring himself into the world to help the father escape.

John Carpenter writes and directs.

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Real Genius centers on several students at Pac Tech, an institution esteemed for its technological breakthroughs. They’re currently working on a project to build a high-powered laser. The project is led by an egotistical professor and TV science show host named Jerry Hathaway (William Atherton), who has been employed by a clandestine group within the Pentagon for Operation Crossbow, whereby the military will use the laser to vaporize targets from space with sniper-like precision.

Enter 15-year-old genius Mitch Taylor (Gabe Jarrett), recruited by Hathaway to start college early at Pacific Tech. He rooms with the school’s prior hot prodigy, a rebellious and smart-alecky senior named Chris Knight (Val Kilmer), who has decided there’s more value in being a slacker than to continue showing everyone he’s the smartest person on campus. Knight’s shenanigans have Hathaway, who must produce the results in an accelerated four months instead of the originally intended eighteen, threatening to kick him out of school if he doesn’t assist in completing the laser in the allotted time. Martha Coolidge directs.

Around the World in 80s Movies Podcast

A concise podcast reviewing the films released in the 1980s, with history, trivia, fun facts, and film critic Vince Leo's personal recollection with the era that defined a generation's taste in movies.

Tag Archives: professor

Prince of Darkness (1987) | John Carpenter

Real Genius (1985) | Martha Coolidge