A kickin' soundtrack and first-rate fight choreography might have drawn audiences to The Crow (1994), but the gothic visuals of director Alex Proyas and the poetic final screen performance of Brandon Lee were what made it a sentimental classic of vengeful angst. Lee's death during filming gave the first film its poignancy and thematic irony, and it saddened Proyas so much that he didn't want to come anywhere near the sequel. Suffice it to say that Vincent Perez, the avenging angel of The Crow: City of Angels, and Tim Pope, a one-and-done first-time helmer, are hardly sufficient replacements to keep the series alive, as it were. Perez can't muster an ounce of Lee's charismatic misery and maturing subtlety as an actor, and Pope's camera can only ape the rotting cityscapes of Proyas' mind, abusing the iconography of the first film without taking it anywhere new. From top to bottom, the project is a C-level retread of the first, and it feels coldly opportunistic -- which may be inevitable when the back story of the original is so wrapped in genuine pathos. The sequel's one pleasure is the astonishing Mia Kirshner as the adult version of Sarah, the troubled teen from The Crow, as well as the only narrative link to that film. An actress whose gothic beauty is the very antidote to bland material, Kirshner is the only otherworldly aspect of a film that dwells in false mysticism.