Fracture is one of those “perfect crime” dramas in which the suspense is created not by whodunit, but will he get away with it.

Anthony Hopkins stars as Crawford, a structural engineer who comes home from work one day and shoots his wife in the face in cold blood.

The shot does not kill her, but puts her in a vegetative state.

Hopkins admits to the crime, and the case is assigned to Willie (Ryan Gosling) a young assistant district attorney with “one foot out the door.” Will is about to embark on a new career as a corporate lawyer with a prestigious firm.

Willie reluctantly accepts the assignment because he is assured that Crawford will plead guilty. Much to his surprise, not only does Crawford plead not guilty, but he is allowed to act as his own attorney.

Hopkins’ Crawford is not as scary as a Hannibal Lecter, but he is creepy in a rather enjoyable way.

You get the chills watching him weave his webs, and make everyone jump as he pulls various strings. Deep down, you almost hope he gets away with it.

One reason for that is because Gosling’s Willie is not a likable person. He is cocky, self-centered and ambitious. And despite having a 97 percent conviction rate he is one of those lawyers who uses short cuts.

You almost root for him to fail. Because even as his case is collapsing around him, Willie doesn’t seem to concern himself nor give his responsibilities his full effort and attention.

That is because he is being distracted by his new “mentor” at his new gig, portrayed by the fetching Rosamund Pike.

And that is one of the movie’s sore points. Their affair begins too quickly and for no apparent reason other than to add to Willie’s distractions. Plus if Pike’s character were as smart a lawyer as she claims to be, she would not get involved with some who would be working under her.

Director Gregory Hoblit works with a sure hand. This TV veteran of the classic Hill Street Blues knows his craft. Too bad, though, he did not pick up the pace and tighten the editing.

At nearly two hours, Fracture is too long and many stretches are too slow.

The ending is not a cheat, but a logical progression from everything that has gone before.

Fracture is good, it’s steady, but it is flat. It fails to deliver any high points of drama or confrontation, even at the payoff.

It’s a film that could have used some sparks and flash.

Bob Bloom is the film critic and DVD reviewer at the Journal & Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bbloom@journalandcourier.com or at bloomjc@yahoo.com. Bloom's reviews also can be found at the Journal & Courier Web site: www.jconline.com
Other reviews by Bloom can be found at the Rottentomatoes Web site: www.rottentomatoes.com.

A sure indication that a movie’s script is deficient is when a character must explain to the audience everything that has transpired.

Such is the case with Perfect Stranger, an insipid potboiler that strains to be some sort of sexual thriller, but leaves you cold and bored instead.

Halle Berry stars as Rowena, an investigative reporter who opens an investigation into the death of Grace. a childhood friend who supposedly was having an affair with a big-time ad agency executive, Harrison Hill, portrayed by Bruce Willis.

To get some dirt on the exec, she goes undercover, getting herself hired at the agency where she insinuates herself with the boss.

But, as in the case of films of this ilk, everything is not what it seems. Everyone is keeping secrets — either from others or themselves.

Director James Foley and screenwriter Todd Komarnicki, working from a story by Jon Bokenkamp, shift suspicions as often as Berry changes costumes.

But some of the characters look so shifty and act so screwy — especially Berry’s computer nerd partner, Miles (Giovanni Ribisi) and Hill’s dark and lovely wife, Mia (Paula Miranda) — that you sense they are merely red herrings.

Who is the killer? The clues are there, but Foley muddies up and clutters the proceedings in such a way that you eventually lose interest.

Plus none of these people are sympathetic. Berry’s Rowena is a self-centered witch and taker who continually heaps verbal abuse on Miles, who is supposed to be her co-worker and friend.

Miles is a pervert, and Hill is a cad and womanizer.

The movie does not provide the audience with anyone to root for, so who cares really who did what to whom. Even Grace, Rowena’s friend, is portrayed as a selfish and sluttish young woman.

Perfect Stranger wastes the time and talents of all involved. It seems that since winning her best actress Oscar for Monster’s Ball, Berry has made a lot of wrong choices.

Either her acting in that film was a fluke, or she is getting very bad career advice.

Perfect Stranger is a movie most of the major performers may want to exclude from their resumes. It is a rancid potboiler. This is one stranger you may want to cross the street to avoid.

Bob Bloom is the film critic and DVD reviewer at the Journal & Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bbloom@journalandcourier.com or at bloomjc@yahoo.com. Bloom's reviews also can be found at the Journal & Courier Web site: www.jconline.com
Other reviews by Bloom can be found at the Rottentomatoes Web site: www.rottentomatoes.com.

If, like me, you have a soft spot in your heart for those exploitation films you used to sneak off to see at the nearest second-run house or drive-in during the late 1960s or ’70s, you will get a kick out of Grindhouse, probably the best — and most expensive — guilty pleasure movie to come along in a long time.

Grindhouse is really a double feature — Planet Terror, written and directed by Robert Rodriguez, and Death Proof written and directed by Quentin Tarantino.

It is not the movies themselves that are great, though the flesh-eating zombie thriller by Rodriquez is the better of the two. Rather, it is the way they are presented.

The filmmakers create the ambiance of a grindhouse cinema, with made up coming attractions, scratchy and splicy prints with missing reels, even ads for a fast-food restaurant next door to the theater.

Both directors ably recreate the cinematic style of those films. Lines are delivered with punctuation marks, the camera work is a bit shaky at times, the acting a little outlandish. All of which, at about 3 hours and 10 minutes, offers a time machine of a movie experience that has faded from the American scene.

For these directors, style definitely trumps substance. They do, however, hedge their bets.

While they rough up the prints to look as though they’ve been dragged though the mud and run through about 1,000 projectors, their special effects are too good and, as such, appear at odds with the directors’ intentions.

Tarantino’s Death Proof cannot sustain the momentum created by the Rodriguez film. While the first film is basically non-stop blood, gore and action, Tarantino’s little opus is a lot of talk, talk, talk.

When he finally does bring on the action, it is hard driving, but somewhat too late.

The opus is saved not by nominal star Kurt Russell, who plays a psychopath named Stuntman Mike, but by stuntwoman Zoe Bell, who was featured in the 2005 documentary, Double Dare, in which her career as a stuntwoman — most notably for Lucy Lawless in Xena, Warrior Princess — was profiled.

Sure, Grindhouse is long and loud. However, it will appeal to film buffs who will get a kick out of this loving homage to a genre of film that has all but disappeared from today’s multiplex screens.

Bob Bloom is the film critic and DVD reviewer at the Journal & Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bbloom@journalandcourier.com or at bloomjc@yahoo.com. Bloom's reviews also can be found at the Journal & Courier Web site: www.jconline.com
Other reviews by Bloom can be found at the Rottentomatoes Web site: www.rottentomatoes.com.

Under its quasi-supernatural veneer, Premonition is really a drama about closure and love.

Linda Hanson woke up Thursday morning, made breakfast for her two girls, then took them to school.

It was an ordinary day until that knock at the door. Linda is told her husband was killed the day before in a horrific accident. For the rest of the day, Linda just goes through the motions.

Waking up the next day, she shuffles downstairs to feed her kids, and sitting with them in the kitchen is her dearly departed, Jim (Nip/Tuck’s Julian McMahon).

Linda is confused and dumbfounded, believing the whole previous day was just a dream.

Ah, but when she awakes the next day. ... You get the picture.

Throughout Premonition, I could not help referencing two very divergent movies — The Sixth Sense and Groundhog Day.

True, Linda is not reliving the same day over and over, but she seems to be aware of events that have already happened or are going to happen.

Plus, she is seeing a dead person — or at least a soon-to-be dead person.

Director Mennan Yapo and writer Bill Kelly prey on audience expectations to propel the story. You think the story is headed one way, then the pair detour to another path.

The film is a tad padded and repetitious. But that repetition serves a purpose as Yapo shows the same events from different perspectives.

Premonition would have made for an interesting episode of One Step Beyond or The Twilight Zone. The premise is difficult to sustain for a feature-length film, yet Yapo makes a valiant effort.

Your interest only flags at intermittent moments.

One of the film’s weak links is the casting of Sandra Bullock as Linda. She plays her role too bottled up. For a woman who has supposedly lost her husband, she displays very little emotion.

McMahon just needs to look handsome, as no extraordinary demands are made on his talents.

Nia Long and Kate Nelligan are wasted in one-note roles as Linda’s best friend and mother.

Premonition’s ending may surprise you. Considering all that went before, it is ironically upbeat and life reaffirming.

It just takes a while to get there.

Bob Bloom is the film critic and DVD reviewer at the Journal & Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bbloom@journalandcourier.com or at bloomjc@yahoo.com. Bloom's reviews also can be found at the Journal & Courier Web site: www.jconline.com
Other reviews by Bloom can be found at the Rottentomatoes Web site: www.rottentomatoes.com.

If 300 is the future of filmmaking, then it is a mixed blessing.

For as directors spend more time fussing over their computers, less attention is given to the actors who merely become extensions of some blue- or green-screen technological hocus-pocus.

What movies will gain via technology could come at the cost of one of the most important components of filmmaking — spontaneity, especially from the performers.

For how can there be room for improvisation or some creative on-the-spot decision when every shot is planned down to the last pixel?

And that is exactly why 300 is such a problematic venture. Filmed in a warehouse, the sets, landscapes, heck, even some of the people and animals, were created in a computer. The movie captures exactly the dark atmosphere director Zack Snyder wanted.

Everything is so precise, so calculated — so cold.

300 is based on a graphic novel by Frank Miller and Lynn Varley, itself inspired by a 1962 movie, The 300 Spartans, that Miller saw as a child.

The movie centers around the battle of Thermopylae in which the Spartans staved off an invading Persian army of hundreds of thousands in an attempt to delay them while the rest of Greece rallied their forces to meet the invaders.

The Spartans were killed, but their courage inspired Greece’s other city-states. At least that’s what the history books tell us.

As director Zack Snyder sees it, Spartans were the Klingons of ancient times. They loved to fight. From birth they were trained for battle. A Spartan warrior lived to die a glorious death.

So when word of the invading Persian horde reaches Sparta, King Leonidas (Gerard Butler) defies the city’s council as well as its prophets and takes 300 of his bravest to block their progress.

Since the movie is based on a graphic novel, the dialogue has a comic book ring to it — a lot of explanation points, a lot of pontificating about honor, death and glory.

Butler either is whispering his words, or shouting “Spartans!” so often that you’d think you were at a Michigan State pep rally.

It all sounds like Braveheart-lite.

Plus, Tyler Bates’ ponderous, militaristic score adds its own punctuation to the proceedings.

The battle scenes are brutal. Blood splatters like rain in a monsoon. Limbs and heads are hacked off. And these are the sequences in which the CGI work comes to the fore; sequences are purposely slowed down, then speed up. You almost wish you had a remote in your hand.

But it all lacks a visceral quality. Ironically, the computer effects make it so clean, so ballet-like, so unrealistic. Battles should be chaotic and messy, not choreographed like an MGM musical.

I am not deriding the movie. On the contrary, I was impressed with its technique.

But I also was saddened. The movie lacks the unexpected, that unscripted moment that is the essence of true moviemaking.

The craftsmanship of 300 is superb. It just lacks soul.

Bob Bloom is the film critic and DVD reviewer at the Journal & Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at [email]bbloom@journalandcourier.com[/email] or at [email]bloomjc@yahoo.com[/email]. Bloom's reviews also can be found at the Journal & Courier Web site: [url]www.jconline.com[/url]
Other reviews by Bloom can be found at the Rottentomatoes Web site: [url]www.rottentomatoes.com[/url].

             A violent killer proves himself to be cunning and strategic when he starts sending cryptic puzzles to California newspapers, calling himself the “Zodiac” killer. Cartoonist Robert Graysmith takes an interest in the case, shadowing reporter Paul Avery. Meanwhile, police find themselves in all-too-frequent jurisdiction battles, as well as having to compete with Avery writing controversial articles and sending unconfirmed reports to television stations. The hunt for this Zodiac killer proves to be devastatingly difficult, and lasts for far longer than anyone could have predicted.

             With a premise surrounding one of the most notorious and unsolved serial killer cases in history, and coming from David Fincher, whose “Se7en” is named by many as the best serial killer movie ever made (some place it second, after “The Silence of the Lambs), greatness is to be expected. Unfortunately, “Zodiac” is an extremely slow, muddled meditation on the cleverness of a killer and the incapability of law enforcement working in concert. Fincher’s style seems incomplete, as the feel of the movie is not quite mysterious or dark enough, and it comes off as simply moody and confused. The film is a ghastly 2 hours and 40 minutes, and stretches on for far too long. It is violent in a way that does not seem completely necessary, and loses its compelling elements as it goes on.

             The performances are merely adequate, and no one stands out as commendable or even worth a mention. Jake Gyllenhaal plays Graysmith exactly as he seems to have been written, making no effort to interpret or expand upon his stage directions, which is a disappointment for someone who showed great range in recent films such as “Jarhead” and “Brokeback Mountain.” Mark Ruffalo, as Inspector David Toschi, still seems to be searching for a defining role which he can truly embody (“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” is the closest he has come recently). Robert Downey Jr., typecast as the sleazy reporter Avery, is off on his own planet, doing his own thing, an approach which doesn’t quite work. The one truly enrapturing performance comes in the form of a bit part from The Drew Carey Show’s John Carroll Lynch as a suspect in the Zodiac case. He chillingly delivers one of his lines in one of the film’s few great scenes: “I’m not the Zodiac, and if I was, I certainly wouldn’t tell you.” That scene is characteristic of how the whole film should feel; unfortunately, it fails to achieve that effect.

The Bottom Line is that David Fincher’s “Zodiac” is a major disappointment. While not terrible, there is little that is truly good about it. Less-than-compelling performances and a lack of appropriate resolution makes the 2 hour and 40 minute runtime seem like an eternity.

Jim Carrey goes all creepy in The Number 23, an unsatisfying psychological thriller about obsession and paranoia that fails to add up to much of anything.

It’s painful to watch a movie that tries so hard to aspire to a level it cannot reach for lack of a coherent and logical script and a hack director.

The screenplay by Fernley Phillips jerks you around in so many directions that when all the pieces finally fit together you either have figured out the puzzle or don’t care what the solution is.

Credit for that can go to director Joel Schumacher, who is infamous for wrecking the Batman franchise and for his mishandling of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom of the Opera a couple of years ago.

In fact, Schumacher should do everyone a favor and never set foot behind a camera again. Everything he handles seems to turn to crap.

In The Number 23, Carrey works as an animal control officer — “a dog catcher,” has he says — named Walter Sparrow (no relation to Capt. Jack).

The problem with the story is Carrey’s Sparrow seems off kilter from the outset, so it is no surprise when, after receiving a book from his wife entitled The Number 23, he begins to go off the deep end, seeing number 23s everywhere.

Walter becomes obsessed with finding the book’s author because much in the story sounds so familiar, as if the author knew Walter’s life intimately.

Anyone with a modicum of cinematic sense can see where this will lead, but Schumacher draws it out endlessly, so a movie that runs about 95 minutes feels as long as one of the extended versions of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Ultimately, the movie is a letdown; the finale unsatisfying.

Carrey gets points for trying to stretch, to step out from his comic persona, but he is continually undone by the script and Schumacher’s direction, which basically keeps him in a perpetual state of upheaval throughout.

And the cinematography, which tries to create an oppressive atmosphere, only produces a murky and dull palate that fails to envelop the audience.

The quirky score by Harry Gregson-Williams carries more suspense than the movie.

The Number 23 lacks cohesion. Schumacher flails around like a drowning man, and takes his picture under with him.

Bob Bloom is the film critic and DVD reviewer at the Journal & Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bbloom@journalandcourier.com or at bloomjc@yahoo.com. Bloom's reviews also can be found at the Journal & Courier Web site: www.jconline.com
Other reviews by Bloom can be found at the Rottentomatoes Web site: www.rottentomatoes.com.

             First off, it is notable that the technical aspects are what lead this film. The cinematography is excellent, and the scenery, which includes sites as different as snow-covered forests and completely dry desert pastures, is beautiful. Dialogue is sparse but the sound quality of a rushing waterfall or a surprising gunshot is fantastic.

            The main problem that exists within “Seraphim Falls” is the lack of a sympathetic character. Carver seems just as despicable and unlikable as the “villain” of the story, Gideon. Carver’s cohorts are generally throwaway characters the audience, and the story, could care less about giving any type of personality traits other than easily scared. Townspeople that first Gideon, and moments or hours later a vengeful and angry Carver, meet seem dumb, ignorant, and unimportant. And the seeming “guest appearance” of Angelica Huston as a smarmy trader is unexplained, unneeded, and distracting.

            Liam Neeson, as the supposed hero Carver, is fine enough but the material he is given is very lacking. He has had far better roles and better performances where he had less to work with. Pierce Brosnan, on the other hand, does more than his fair share of panting as Gideon, and his work is mostly concerned with his facial expressions and gestures. Never having been a fan of Mr. Brosnan, I was not overwhelmingly impressed, but he certainly did as much as he could with the role. The movie Is similar to the performances: nice premise with less-than-overwhelming plot development, lacking that necessary element to fully draw you in.

 

The Bottom Line is that David Von Ancken’s “Seraphim Falls” is certainly a visually excellent film, but its underwhelming performances and the lack of a truly compelling narrative keep it from being a great and fully enjoyable film.

 

 

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             In the midst of the second world war, Japan continues to fight and defend the island of Iwo Jima. General Tadamichi Kuribayashi arrives to take charge, and faces some resistance as some of his subordinates believe that he is an incompetent American sympathizer. The story also follows the daily life of likeable soldier Saigo, and his struggles to cope with the war. The film centers around preparations for what most believe will be a suicide mission.

            Clint Eastwood has crafted a surprisingly fair realization of the other side, making sure not to make the Japanese seem inhumane, and especially to not make the Americans seem too humane. Eastwood’s companion piece to last year’s underwhelming “Flags of our Fathers” centers much more on the actual battle, choosing not to flash back from the present, and as a result offer a clearer lens through which the war can be seen.

             The film is very much sympathetic to the Japanese side, not necessarily their endgame but rather their methods and intentions, which in this case is both a nice surprise from the filmmaker as well as a great cinematic choice. Ken Watanabe, as General Kuribayashi, and Kazunari Ninomiya, as Saigo, are a large part of the very much excellent ensemble. The film, almost entirely in Japanese, has a very authentic, real feel to it, with occasional flashbacks providing a sufficient, but not burdensome, amount of background information to make the characters both understandable and sympathetic.

             Certain scenes are difficult to watch due to their outright violence, but overall the violence is appropriate and not excessive for a war film. The film suffers slightly due to the relative lack of action in the first hour or so, and the runtime of almost two and a half hours drags. Luckily, the film’s second half is the more compelling, and it’s certainly worth staying until the film’s end.

The Bottom Line is that Clint Eastwood’s “Letters from Iwo Jima” is a fine war film made about the Japanese from an American director with a surprising evenhandedness to it. The lengthy film drags a bit, but is certainly a notable improvement on Eastwood’s earlier companion piece “Flags of our Fathers.”

 

             In 1944 Spain, a young girl named Ofelia is forced to live with her mother and her new husband, a vicious and violent general still furiously seeking out rebels. Ofelia lives in her own fantasy world, where fascinating creatures and events mirror that which occurs in the real world around her. She can only go on for so long before her two worlds collide and the real world comes crashing down onto her.

            “Pan’s Labyrinth” is very much unlike any other movie you will see. Fascinating from its first moments, it is a fantastically intriguing journey into the mind of a young girl trying to cope with her surroundings. The myth which introduces the basis for her fantasies sets a very nice tone for the film, and Ivana Baquero’s performance as Ofelia is so strong. She rarely lets her fear show through, and very often the audience seems more scared than Ofelia.

            The other performances in the film are great, with Sergi López as Ofelia’s stepfather and possibly the most evil villain ever seen on screen. Maribel Verdú, known for her role in 2002’s “Y Tu Mama Tambien” is also great as a employee of Ofelia’s stepfather who serves as more of a mother figure to Ofelia than her own mother.

            The film’s scenery is certainly visually pleasing, and there is a nice amount of suspense and fantasy intermixed throughout. The movie’s general ambiguity about Ofelia’s fantasy world works well, and it is fun to try to match up characters and symbols that exist in Ofelia’s world and the real one.

            The movie, however, never quite reaches a point of complete greatness, and as intriguing as Ofelia’s world is, it still seems just a bit far-fetched. While that may be the point, the movie is missing that crucial “wow factor” that many other critics seem to have found. The film also contains a surprising amount of graphic, cringe-worthy violence, which, while not completely unnecessary, is very much shocking and revolting.