Two great movies wrapped into one chaotic film.

Rating: 7/10 (24 February 2007)

I will give the director Joel Schumacher an applause for several things.First, the cinematography for the most part was beautiful. If this film were a canvas then he would be a Leonardo. Second, the acting was great as well. In fact I think it's been a while where I saw a movie where there were no BAD actors(Usually they throw one in as a secondary character, for cost I presume). Third, "The Number 23" was "TWO" great stories; and that was the problem with the film.
The movie takes two great concepts and blends them together. As a result you are presented with an extra long movie that makes sense only when you break it apart and excuses its' faults as unexplained phenomena. Why is this such an issue? Truth be told there was already a fan base for this movie based on the concept of the number alone. In my opinion many left with no closure to that spooky coincidence which bothered me more-so than friends I saw it with. Mainly because I had a personal experience concerning the same phenomena as Jim Carry's character. In all honesty, I noticed that the audience treated the movie like it was two separate entities. So much so that they would laugh because it would contradict itself over and over again.
The director should have chopped this script and storyline into two and made double the money by directing 2 really good and interesting films (that should have nothing to do with each other). "The Number 23" could have been one that dealt with the phenomena of the number and how it affects people as a whole, and the other movie,(possibly called "The Writer"?) could have been the other film concerning what Jim Carrey's character went through on the surface and could have been awesome without bringing up the number at all.
My apologies for being so vague in certain areas as I do not want to give away the ending to these whom have not watched it, but I will say this: the director did fail when it came to the end for the simple fact that he took away the mystery by explaining way to much. And once the audience understood why things were the way they were, he kept going on anyway. Not only did this bore half the audience, but it took the mystery and eerie feeling away for the other half.
Overall, I give this movie a C+/B- for the sheer fact that it was a very good effort that only lacked in non-chaotic script writing. The good news is that with any hope, Virginia Madsen will continue to get move roles that she deserves. For too many years she spent time in the lime-light doing B movies when in reality, she is one of the best actresses that Hollywood has. And, she has a silver screen beauty that todays actresses can't touch.