wonderful and surprising

Rating: 10/10 (12 April 2002)

this is a whole hearted endorsement of this film without any plot spoilers i'm lucky(sensible)enough to have a multi region dvd player which living in england is an absolute neccesity anyway i'm syrfing my favourite region 1 sites when i see this eye catching advert for a film called donnie darko which i'd absolutely never heard ofintrigued i looked it up here and noted the endorsements and high votes it had been receiving then on whim ordered it having watched it four days ago i'm still thinking about it constantly! it is a mini masterpiece which probably defies any real genre classification containing elements of sci-fi,horror,teen angst,comedy and more all i can say is see it and be astounded especially if you come to it like i did without any preconceptions of what to expect (not even having seen a trailer) suffice to say the mood is atmospheric the acting of the lead is stunning and you will be debating with whoever you watch it with what happened for days to follow (it also has a superb 80's soundtrack with a beautiful haunting cover of tears for fears mad world which deserves to be a huge hit itself) so to sum up great film defying any expectations cudos goes out to richard kelly the writer/director on his first feature the only warning i'd give is that the blurb on the back of the dvd seems to have been written by someone who hasn't really paid much attention to the film itself (which if anything actually adds to the enjoyment as it reduces your expectations) oh by the way it's a superbly crafted dvd with great extras too