'Donkey Punch,' 'Growing Out,' 'The Lodger' and 'Prometheus Triumphant'

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'Prometheus' finds its way

Jim Towns and Mike McKown's "Prometheus Triumphant: A Fugue in the Key of Flesh" is an admirably ambitious homage to the pure emotional power of the classic silent cinema.

In a remote German community in 1890, where "the last great plague" has struck, Janick (Josh Ebel), a young doctor, has invented an electrical device he claims is capable of bringing the dead back to life. After being condemned by the academic community and having acid thrown in his face -- shades of "The Phantom of the Opera" -- he becomes a recluse, driven by loneliness to try to resurrect his beloved Esmeralda (Kelly Lynn), who has succumbed to the plague.

It was perhaps impossible for Towns and McKown to escape some degree of self-consciousness in this attempt to evoke the timeless anguish of a Lon Chaney film or the masterpieces of German Expressionism. In any event, "Prometheus," for all its poetic visual bravura, seems distant when it should be dynamic, yet still worth the effort. By the time it reaches its bold conclusion it has moved beyond pastiche to come entirely into its own.

-- Kevin Thomas

"Prometheus Triumphant." MPAA rating: Unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 19 minutes. At Laemmle's Grande 4-Plex, 345 S. Figueroa St., downtown Los Angeles. (213) 617-0268.