The Number 23

Rating: 4/10 (21 December 2012)

In the world there is apparently some "23 enigma", where the number 23 appears in many prominent places in history, for example, blood takes 23 seconds to circulate round the human body, William Shakespeare lived 23 April 1564-1616, Bonnie and Clyde were shot dead 23 May 1934, and many other connections, and this film was made to expose this, from director Joel Schumacher (Batman Forever, Phone Booth). Basically on his birthday, animal control officer Walter Sparrow (Jim Carrey) is bitten by a vicious dog he is trying to catch and late to pick up his wife Agatha (Candyman's Virginia Madsen), but when they catch up she is in a bookstore buying his present. She has bought him a red covered murder mystery book called The Number 23 written by someone called Topsy Kretts, and soon after starting to read it he is captivated by it, because he finds connections in his own life and experiences with the number 23, he starts dreaming things associated, and he even associates with the story of the book's character Fingerling and his love Fabrizia. Walter is becoming obsessed with the novel that he is desperate to finish it and find out more about the writer, even going to the lengths and trying to find Topsy Kretts, based on some of entries in the book that lead to addresses and people who may know him, only Walter's teenage son Robin (Logan Lerman) is prepared to help him, but not Agatha much. He eventually finishes the book, which ends on a blank spot, and he is sure that it is not a fiction book, and the writer is a real man, and the name Topsy Kretts is of course a pseudonym for the words "top secrets", but his obsession for the number 23 is causing not just distress and paranoia, but some danger to his family. In the end, the murder mystery story of the book is finally revealed to him, as he finds the room written about in the book, a motel room 23, and on the walls are written the words for the final chapter of the book, and in fact, Topsy Kretts is Walter himself, he erased any memory of the murder of Laura Tollins (Ali G Indahouse's Rhona Mitra) when he was sent to a mental institute, so in the end, knowing he did wrong he hands himself in to the police to serve some time and relieve his guilt. Also starring Danny Huston as Isaac / Dr. Miles Phoenix, Lynn Collins as Suicide Blonde / Mrs. Dobkins / Young Fingerling's mother, Michelle Arthur as Sybil and Mark Pellegrino as Kyle Flinch. Carrey gives a reasonably interesting double edged performance with the small amusing moments we're used to overpowered by his dark aide, and Madsen does well as his worried wife, me myself I do not believe in any conspiracy theories or connections like this, it is just coincidental, certainly the story is chilling enough to be interesting, but overall the film is a slow and sometimes predictable psychological thriller. Okay!