RobMcC

Although this film has hints of the chillingly mysterious horrors that are conveyed in Lovecraft's stories, in is incredibly boring, awkward and stilted. The best performance in the film is turned in by Sandra Dee, which may give you a clue about the low quality of the acting by such generally competent performers as Ed Begley and Sam Jaffe. Dean Stockwell phones in what must be the worst job of his career. The dialog is at times incoherent. The special effects abysmal. The editing, non-existent. I lay the blame for most faults squarely on the shoulders of the director, a former designer and art director on some classic horror films who seems to be well out of his area of competence here. The film clearly must have had a lowest of the low budget as well. Alas, we have yet to see a really good treatment of any Lovecraftian tale on film.

I went in to this film with no prior knowledge of what it was about (no easy task in this day and age of give the farm away trailers and a constant barrage of TV propaganda clips). I generally found the plot absorbing for at least the first 45 minutes, but it tended to drag a lot and was rather predictable once you got the gist of what was going on. Ethan Hawke as the lead was immensely boring and monotonic, Uma Thurman as the romantic interest was not much better. Jude Law walked away with the picture in the acting department and the art direction took second honors with a view of a squeaky-clean regimented future. I think the best part of the film was the opening titles actually. There were many plot absurdities and nonsensical aspects to this view of a possible future which detracted from the overall impression as well, but nothing any more absurd than the resolution in ID4 :-)

This film and the other 3 delightful comedic mystery films featuring Margaret Rutherford as Agatha Christie's sleuth Miss Jane Marple are masterpieces of the last golden age of British cimema. The ensemble casts are wonderful, the B&W cinematography is beautiful, the music is delightful. Don't expect to see the Miss Marple of the later TV series or of the original Christie books, This is a brilliantly regenerated Marple, crafted to fit Miss Rutherford's inimitable comedic style. This is true film-making creativity at work, not just slavish imitation of the original works the films were (loosely) based on. I never tire of watching these little gems.