 The
Gift
Review
[March.2001]
This was originally published by spidermanhype.com
in my days of working with Mirko and those fella's. But since I wrote
it I figured I may as well bring it on over here. Booyeah.
"The Gift" Review
By Clint Vander Klok
Well we all know that Sam Raimi is
a great director. From Evil Dead all the way through to this new
offering. Raimi even made a Kevin Costner movie that didn't suck (much)
but we'll forgive him for that. Since Sam is going to be directing
Spider-Man I thought I would give a few thoughts to his new movie, The
Gift, which I had the pleasure of sneak peeking most recently.
Where shall we begin, well why not with the writers of this fun and
very scary movie. Billy Bob Thornton and Tom Epperson, who did a very
solid job on this movie. Now there are a lot of turns and finger
pointings going on in this movie, and although the ending was turn
after turn after turn, it didn't sneak up on you in the way that Usual
Suspects or 6th sense did. You sorta see it coming from far off, but
having said that, it's almost a pleasure seeing how it plays out.
The movie begins with the story of a small town psychic Annie Wilson
played perfectly by Cate Blanchett. She has a few young children that
although are part of the story, never really factor into the plot.
Annie has recently been widowed, but once again this is only background
on the character, and not a big part of the story as it unfolds. The
loss of her husband and the fact that she has to take care of her
children herself more or less makes you feel sorry for Annie but you
realize that she is a strong person. Raimi did a real good job of
making Annie look defenseless but still fairly headstrong.
The film seems to have a long beginning, a very quick and short middle
and a fast but enjoyable ending. The movie basically sets up the folks
of this Twin Peaks type town and wants the audience to feel that there
are many suspects for this supernatural murder mystery. It begins with
one of Annie's clients whom she does readings for, Valerie Barksdale,
played by Hilary Swank. Hilary did what she could with this role, but
there wasn't much there, it was more to set up her wife beating husband
Donny played by Keanu Reeves. Now I've never been a fan either way of
Reeves except for of course the Matrix. But in this movie, Reeves does
a great job of playing a menacing and frightening person. He's so scary
in fact, that in one scene when he goes after Annie with a punch to the
stomach, you actually fear Reeves yourself. Annie tells Valerie to
leave her husband, which only
encourages Donnie to go after Annie with threats to her and her family.
Another client of Annies is Buddy, a very off centered and disturbed
auto mechanic played by Giovanni Ribisi. He seems to have a heart of
gold but you slowly see him spin off center, putting him on the list of
suspects. There is a great scene between Giovanni and Reeves that
really lets you know that you are in some very strange waters in this
town. Slowly but surely the characters of the town begin to pop up, a
Greg Kinnear here and Katie Holmes there, suddenly, Annie sees
something strange when she is talking to Jessica King, Katie Holmes'
character (which I don't want to give away), and poof, a few days later
she vanishes. This is the meat of the story and the movie goes off in
many "whodunnit" directions making you wonder where the butler was at
the time of the death.
Greg Kinnear plays Wayne, the principal of the local school and the
fiancé of Jessica King. It's a
pleasure to see a complex story made simple, Raimi spoon feeds us the
plot but just when you relax and think you have the hang of the movie,
Raimi literally scares the pants off you. I would say I jumped 3 times
this entire movie, which for me, is a first. In fact, Raimi will make
you jump within the first 30 seconds of the movie.
Of course we also have Gary Cole playing David Duncan, a local police
authority. Now I was a big fan of American Gothic when it was on the
air back in 1995 when Gary played Sheriff Lucas Buck. Sam Raimi was an
executive producer on the show, and so Bruce Campbell made an
appearance on an episode, but we're getting ahead of ourselves here. I
guess seeing good ol Gary Cole on the show actually made you feel like
you were watching a spin off of American Gothic, since the
supernatural things happening here were not unlike those of the TV
show. AAAh, anyway, back to my review.
And now for the final and most important character of The Gift. May the
academy award go to "TENSION". I mean it was almost as if Tension was a
living breathing person in this movie. Through the whole movie, you
actually felt like tension itself was a character in every scene. He
was around
every corner, and in every shot of the film. Although he never actually
spoke it was like at any time he was about to start screaming and that
in itself made the silence deafening. This whole movie made me very
tense and it was hard to sit there and realize you were watching a
movie, I was
totally wrapped up in the plot, the characters and the direction
everything was going in. This is the sort of film where you forget to
eat your popcorn. You were pretty sure you knew what would happen, but
between the tension and the uncertainty of this different reality where
psychics and murderers all live next door to each other in a small
town. You were never too sure where you would end up when the credits
rolled and you could go home and hug your teddy bear and tell yourself,
it was all just a movie.
After seeing this movie, I have every confidence that Sam Raimi will
make Spider-Man, a movie that you suspend disbelief and just enjoy what
is going on around you, because Raimi can make those kinds of
characters live and breathe on screen. I give The Gift Two thumbs up.
See it when it comes to your hood.
I am outta here.
Clint "Sevy" Vander Klok
PS: Watch for a cameo of Ash's car from the EVIL DEAD films. Heavy
Raimi fans will know the story behind this. If not LISTEN TO THE
DIRECTORS COMMENTARY ON EVIL DEAD! Nuff Said
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