It sounded slightly reminiscent of a film I’d seen years ago titled ‘Race With The Devil’, about a pair of couples who stumble upon a satanic ritual then end being pursued by the cult throughout the film. Well the only thing the two films have in common is they both used ‘devil’ in their titles!! Besides, I should’ve known better when I realized how much the cover resembles ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’. From Brandon May, the director of such classics as Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood and Hunter: Nobody walks in L.A. and C. Courtney Joyner, the writer of such..er...classics as Trancers 3, Puppet Master 3: Toulon’s Revenge (HEY! What's wrong with Puppet Master 3? -- M) we get Devil’s Prey!

The movie opens with a scantily-clad woman tied to a pallet while people in black robes and really stupid sneering white masks chant around her. She’s slashed repeatedly with a small dagger while a machete is warmed over a flame. Of course, her top is cut off to give us a bit of T&A to draw us in, then the machete is swung, she screams and cut to a busy downtown evening. Here we meet our main characters-David (played by Charlie O’ Connell of Sliders fame), he’s waiting to hear from Stanford so he’s shown as a responsible guy; Eric (Bryan Kirkwood) a drug dealer; Samantha (Jennifer Lyons), Eric’s whiny girlfriend; and Joe (Rashaan Nall) their black friend. They’re waiting for David’s girlfriend, Susan (Ashley Jones) to get off from her waitressing job. The bells were going off immediately here-Joe is the only one without a girlfriend or anything really.

But to be fair, none of the characters are given much character development, they’re cookie cutter: the good guy, the good girl, the bad boy, the bad girl and the black guy-guess who the victims will be? But I’m getting ahead of myself. While waiting for Susan, the gang is invited to a rave. The good couple are wary but the drug dealer immediately thinks of all the money he can make selling his wares at the party. So off they go! It doesn’t take them long to get into the swing of things at the party; David gets into some dirty dancing on the dance floor with 2 girls while Samantha is bitching to Susan about Eric’s lack of direction in life.

The bartender/host offers the girls some Ecstasy, which Samantha happily takes while Susan doesn’t. Susan then notices David’s dirty dancing and goes over to him and they begin to dance. With a nod from the bartender/host, one of the guest bumps into David then starts a fight. Samantha, feeling randy from the e, throws herself at one of the party guests-seems Eric was too busy dealing to notice. Doesn’t this girl know raging hormones=death in these types of movies? So they’re thrown out the rave, the bartender tells 2 guys it’s time to prove themselves, and the chase is on.

A blood-streaked woman, Fawn (Elena Lyons) wanders into the road and they hit her. Of course the bad couple wants to leave her but Susan & David carry her into the car. She tells them of escaping from a cult that wanted to hurt her and Susan immediately takes to her, vowing they’d protect her. A van shows up to run them off the road and their car flips into a ravine. They’re all hurt in varying degrees but are afraid to get out of the car. The black guy, having done burglary (OF COURSE!!) volunteers to scout and see if the van is gone. It is and everyone gets out of the car, painfully.

Samantha further shows up her shrewish side by shrieking more about the blood ruining her outfit than her actual injury. She also begins to threaten Fawn with a lawsuit courtesy of her lawyer daddy. Was I wrong to hope for a cult member to come up behind HER with a heated machete? And hmmm….lawsuit or blood sacrifice, which scares YOU more? With the car crashed up, they must flee on foot. Joe, the black guy, fulfills his destiny by being first hit by the van then captured by the cult members! Thanks for playing the game, Joe!

The rest of the group finds a shack, where they immediately run in, turn on lights and argue with each other! It seems Samantha & Eric don’t trust Fawn, they think it’s all a set-up. Susan defends her then notices Fawn using her skirt to wipe David’s face. Very weird scene there… With all the shouting, of course they’re discovered by the cult members so they fight them off and run back into the woods. Fawn saves them from one member by beating him to death with a big branch. They knock out another then David discovers *gasp* it’s one of the girls who was rubbing up against him at the rave!! For no reason at all, Susan dons the girl’s robe but leaves the mask. I thought she would take it to mix in with the group but I guess she thought it went well with her ensemble.

They dodge the cult until morning, where they finally come upon a church and meet Father Seth, played by Patrick Bergin, whose career is seriously waning since he’s doing this film. He listens to their story and has heard of the cult so he takes them to the Sheriff (Tim Thomerson!!) Of course, the sheriff believes nothing they say, suspecting THEM more than anything. One thing I found very interesting was , despite their blood-streaked clothes and faces, NO ONE thought of taking them to the hospital! The sheriff decides to take Susan, David & Fawn (the worse looking one of the bunch blood-wise) to the scene of the crime where, of course they find nothing. No, wait, they DO find Joe’s glasses but then the sheriff suspects that THEY’VE done something to Joe. Then we get scenes of Joe being tortured then killed with the machete!

Meanwhile, Samantha & Eric are left in the care of the overly solicitous waitress & head cook at the diner. This night has both changed them for the better and we get to see them declare their love for each other before Eric goes down to the phone booth to call his parole officer. Samantha then gets conked over the head with a frying pan by the waitress and carried off by the cook! Eric discovers the phone wires cut then runs back to the diner only to see them dumping Samantha in the flatbed and taking off.

Back to Susan, Fawn & David with the sheriff, he’s driving them back when the van comes out of nowhere and cuts them off. Fawn grabs David and knocks his head against the window , knocking him out while Father Seth gets out of the van and shoots the Sheriff right between the eyes! Susan gets out of the car and takes off, prompting Fawn to scream with great relish ‘get that FUCKING BITCH!!!’ The word ‘bitch’ is used quite a bit in this film too and in the nasty old-fashioned way! It’s become such an affectionate term but this cast uses it with malicious glee!! They can’t find Susan (never occurred to look behind the great pillars, I guess) so they take David off in the van while Fawn & Father Seth damn near do it in the road.

Susan goes back into town where she finds Eric and they compare notes. They try to rent a car from the gas station attendant but *egads* he’s in on it too!!! They end up kicking out a jack and pinning him under the car he was working on. Then the waitress and rave bartender/host drive up to the diner in the truck so Eric & Susan go hide under the tarp conveniently there in the flatbed! The rave guy is wondering if this ceremony will really help him and the waitress assures him that he’ll never have another worry afterwards. Wait a minute, you’re in this cult and you’re a WAITRESS!! Not that there’s anything wrong with that but somehow, giving my soul to Satan and doing blood sacrifices, I’d expect a bit higher station than that-like a wealthy trendsetter or ruler of my own country, you know-real power!

Anyway, they go to a lovely ranch house where Fawn is now dressed in a black robe and groping Father Seth again. He brings her into show her Samantha, who’s half naked and tied to the pallet. They torture her a little then Fawn says she’s impure! Never mind the ritual then, they just kill her! And she’s featured so prominently on the box too…

Eric & Susan are creeping around the grounds when the cook comes up behind them and stabs Eric in the back then knocks out Susan. She wakes up, half dressed and trussed to the pallet. Fawn does a little pseudo-lesbian interaction with her then bristles when Susan invokes Jesus’ name. Father Seth knows how strong Susan’s soul is and tries to convince her to join their side but she refuses. They show her Samantha’s body (but not Joe’s-maybe because HE wasn’t scantily-dressed?) and she cries but still refuses.

They all don those stupid sneering masks with Susan as the intended victim. Then when Father Seth raises the machete; Eric finds the strength to drive a truck through the wall, interrupting the ritual. Susan cuts David loose then basically stands around while HE fights the cultists-BUT she does yell his name whenever someone sneaks up behind him! Fawn notices her then grabs a knife and goes after her. In one of the dumbest scenes, Fawn runs into the knife Susan is holding straight in front of her! Eric notices gas leaking from under the truck and tells them to run while he pulls out his lighter.

They run, the place explodes, the end. Or is it? Of course not, silly rabbit! They jump into a truck but can’t get it started. Then of course a well-cooked Father Seth comes out of nowhere and snatches David out of the car. Susan finally gets the car started then plows into Father Seth who then flies up in the air and gets impaled on a fence post! Cut to 6 months later and David is indeed at Stanford and sharing an apartment with Susan. He goes off to school, then someone slips a rave invitation under the apartment door. Susan opens the door and heeeeeerre’s Fawn!! Susan slams the door in her face then opens it again-no one there. BUT she doesn’t see Father Seth, dressed rather smartly (great tailors in hell!!), standing behind her.….

There, that’s the film. I thought it was pointless, cliched, and just bad.