How stoked would you be to see a movie about a teenage Jesus and his creepy new friend, Satan? Especially if the cast included Nicolas Cage (although not, alas, in the Jesus role), and extra-especially if the picture were also a horror movie? How quickly would you be making a beeline for Fandango to nail down a seat for the next screening of such a sure-to-be cult classic?

Well, hold up a minute. "The Carpenter's Son" is indeed a singular movie, one that attempts to do something new, but doesn't quite work. The picture tells a story set in the dark, violent world of Roman-ruled Egypt in the early first century — a place where ancient gods linger as a new messiah prepares to rise. This deity will have much to occupy his time. We see crucifixion poles towering against the sky, topped with dying wretches gazing down in agony. We see cadavers carpeting the landscape, and bloody flesh glistening in the moonlight.

This is almost a horror movie, and might have been better if it were more of one. As it is, even with considerable gore, a huge, throat-swelling serpent, and the bizarre intrusions of a delirious madman, the movie lacks the pulpy kick of most of the best cinematic horror. And while its Egyptian-born writer-director, Lotfy Nathan, shot the film in Greece (as close as authorities would let him get to Egypt), the timeless rocky landscape and atmospheric night lighting do nothing to invigorate the movie's pageant-like pace. (The director says he was inspired to make the film by reading among the remains of the second-century "Infancy Gospel of Thomas," an apocryphal text that purports to recount Jesus's childhood. That's probably a little slow, too.)

It's unclear why Nathan wanted Cage to play Jesus' father, the itinerant carpenter traditionally called Joseph (although that's not what he's called here, where none of the characters bear their familiar Biblical names). The mad flamboyance with which the actor's performances are now associated would unbalance this carefully low-key picture, so he is a muted presence throughout. Even more recessive is singer FKA Twigs, who plays Jesus' mother. And while Noah Jupe (of the "Quiet Place" movies) does convey the future Savior's conflicted spiritual nature, he also has the misfortune to be effortlessly outshone by the movie's true star, Isla Johnston.

Johnston is an 18-year-old English actress known for, among other things, playing a younger version of Anya Taylor-Joy's chess-prodigy character in "The Queen's Gambit." Here, inventively cast as the incarnation of evil, she projects an almost unnerving stillness, and whether idly tormenting scorpions or bearing down in a verbal joust with Jupe, she can be strikingly malevolent. When she lifts her big green eyes to the camera, she might be looking up at us from underneath a rock. And when the future Jesus asks her who she is, and she tells him "I am the adversary. ... I've been searching for you for so long," we get the feeling he knows how long and rocky a road lies ahead.

Photos courtesy of Magnolia Pictures