History Film / TheRelic

''The Relic'' (or ''Relic'') is a 1997 film adaptation of a novel by [[Literature/AgentPendergast Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child]], directed by Creator/PeterHyams, starring Tom Sizemore, Penelope Ann Miller, and Linda Hunt.

** The police searching for the killer end up filling a homeless man living in the basement full of lead. While he's not responsible for the murders they're investigating, he's still a serial rapist and wanted for several potential murders.

* KillItWithFire: [[spoiler:Margo takes out the Kothoga by setting a lab on fire.]]

* NonMaliciousMonster: It is just trying to survive by the new diet it has been given.

* OffWithHisHead: The Kothoga's mandibles make it able to easily chop heads off from its victims.

* RecycledInSpace: It’s essentially “Jaws; in a Museum”, particularly in its subplot of the police detective clashing over bureaucrats wanting to keep the museum open, despite the danger
* SendInTheSearchTeam: The SWAT team sent into the museum to rescue those trapped and kill the Kothoga.

* HollywoodDarkness: Deliberately averted, almost to an unwatchable degree as it's very difficult to see much for the second half of the movie. Long story short, blame the home video producers.

* AssholeVictim: [[spoiler:Lee and Tom Parkinson]]

** In the novel, Gregory Kawakita [[spoiler:does a FaceHeelTurn at the end and started selling the Mbwun reovirus as a drug]], here Greg Lee never did such a heinous thing like, even he is still a SmugSnake whose only worst action was locking two of his colleagues in the offices.

* AdaptationalVillainy: In the novel, Gregory Kawakita was an intellectual loner; in the film, Greg Lee was an underhanded SmugSnake.

* HollywoodDarkness: Deliberately averted, almost to an unwatchable degree as it's very difficult to see much for the second half of the movie.

* AdaptationNameChange: The monster in the film is called the Kothoga, possibly because actually ''saying'' "Mbwun" out loud is a lot harder than reading it.

* HollywoodDarkness: Deliberately averted, almost to an unwatchable degree as it's very difficult to see much for the second half of the movie,

** The Kothoga encounters a dog, but ignores it because it doesn't have a suitable hypothalamus to consume.

* OurMonstersAreWeird: The Kothoga, more so than the book: [[spoiler:Mbwun was recognizably human once, with saurian legs and tail, a gorilla-like head and apelike facial features. Kothoga still has the saurian legs and tail, but the head looks like a Lovecraftian cross between a lizard, insect, [[{{Franchise/Alien}} Xenomorph]], and deep-sea fish. It also definitely had a lizard-like tongue.]]

* BrainFood: The Kothoga. Human brains aren't its first choice, though; it prefers to eat the plants from the Amazon used as packing material in some specimen crates, which have much higher concentrations of the hormones and such it needs. The events of the novel happen because the crates are moved to a more secure area of the basement after a curator notices they've been broken into, forcing it to search for alternatives (read: brains).

* NonMaliciousMonster

* WasOnceAMan: [[spoiler: The Kothoga]].

** DecompositeCharacter: D'Agosta's part in the last act of the book is largely taken over by Hollingsworth in the film, with D'Agosta filling Pendergast's role.

* BlackDudeDiesFirst: The black security guard Frederick Ford (played by the same actor who also is the raptors' appetizer in ''Film/JurassicPark'') is the first to get it.

* AdaptationalVillainy: In the novel, Gregory Kawakita was an intellectual loner, in the film, Greg Lee was an underhanded SmugSnake.

* BrainFood: The Kothoga. Human brains aren't its first choice, though, it prefers to eat the plants from the Amazon used as packing material in some specimen crates (which have much higher concentrations of the hormones and such it needs). The events of the novel happen because the crates are moved to a more secure area of the basement after a curator notices they've been broken into, forcing it to search for alternatives (read: brains).

''The Relic'' (or ''Relic'') is a film adaptation of a novel by [[Literature/AgentPendergast Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child]] starring Tom Sizemore released in 1997.

[[quoteright:324:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TheRelic_6282.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:324:Everything old is new again.]]

** Dr. John Whittlesey, [[spoiler:the monster's human identity]], becomes Dr. John Whitney in the movie.

* BlackDudeDiesFirst: The black security guard is the first to get it.
** With a slow zoom on the reefer he was smoking in the restroom as he's mauled off-screen, no less. DrugsAreBad, folks.

* AssholeVictim: [[spoiler:Lee]]

* {{Jerkass}}: Dr. Lee throws his hat in against Margo for a grant he doesn't even need (and she will have to close down without) and then to up his odds of getting said grant, he has her "accidentally" locked into the labs during the party so he can brown nose the benefactors in peace.

* AdaptationNameChange: The monster in the film is called the Kothoga, possibly because actually ''saying'' "Mwbun" out loud is a lot harder than reading it.

[[caption-width-right:324:]]

* OurMonstersAreWeird: The Kothoga, more so than the book: [[spoiler:whereas Mwbun was recognizably human once (saurian legs and tail, gorilla-like head and facial features, this is some sort of tiger/fly hybrid.]]

* ViewersAreMorons: There are quite a few glaring examples when compared to the source material. Any difficult names are dumbed down (Whittlesey becomes Whitney, Kawakita becomes Lee), the monster Mbwun and the tribe that controlled it, The Kothoga, are combined into one term.
** And if you didn't get it five minutes ago when we told you he's afraid of black cats, we'll remind you now that D'Agosta is superstitious by having him refuse to pick up a penny wrong-side-down, and five minutes from now when we tell you about his lucky bullet.

* IndyHatRoll: Panicked party guests try to flee the museum as the security doors are activated. Some don't make it and are caught and crushed by the steel doors. Seeing as what the rest were [[EldritchAbomination trapped with]], they were probably the lucky ones.