20 Perfect Scenes In Otherwise Terrible Horror Movies
19. Countdown - P.J. Byrne's Hilarious Cameo
Good old P.J. Byrne, eh? He's such a funny guy, and a real master at stealing scenes with his comedic turns. Prior to this 2019 flick, Byrne wasn't new to the horror genre - he absolutely stole the show in 2011's Final Destination 5 - and in Countdown, a mostly underwhelming killer-phone-app horror, he was back at it again.
Byrne plays Father John, a priest who's an expert on demonic forces. In most lame PG-13 supernatural horror flicks like this one, such a character would be a bland Basil Exposition figure, but the filmmakers intelligently made Father John a comic relief figure, and in Byrne's hands, he's utterly hilarious. Just for a few moments, viewers will feel like they are watching a different, far more entertaining film.
Really, this part strongly suggested that Countdown should've gone down the horror-comedy route instead. As flat as this movie mostly was, it was at its best when it was trying to be funny, and besides, the idea of a phone app created by a demon is fairly goofy to begin with.