**1/2 out of 5

Rating: Null/10 (17 March 2003)

As you all sit there, scratching your head in wonder over who made the video and who was on the other end of that dreaded phone call, I sit here in all my slumber, merely a day after viewing this film and wonder how such a beautiful looking piece of cinematography could be so bad. This film tenders on the brink or ridiculous and seems content on explaining to us what is going on while never giving us anything to even remotely attempt to fathom what has just happened on the screen before us. Mulholland Drive bombshell Naomi Watts stars as Rachel Keller. She is a single parent who lives in a high rise apartment and works as a journalist. When her niece faces sudden death (seen in the films prologue) Rachel fins herself out to investigate a mysterious video tape that, when watched will kill you in seven days. Rachel stumbles upon this video and after watching it runs around in a frantic panic to find out what is going on before her seven days are up. Yet after being viewed by her son and his father she is still running around in a stupor and we still have no clue what is going on. This film has some sort of hypnotic grip surrounding it that will either hold you until the very end or release you very early on, if you haven't guessed it released me. The film runs just a minute short of an hour, a time that makes it so tedious you will end up wondering when this thing will finally end more than what the heck is going on. The film was beautifully directed by Gore Verbinski who adds a certain aura of demented beauty into the repulsive images that plague the screen and rob the film of any real scares. The mixing of bright colours set upon the tone of a grey backdrop makes for a haunting images and probably the films only artful image (I am talking about a lone tree that stands atop a dying plain that slips from grey to bright red was the sun slowly glazes over it). The best part of the film by far is the video itself. Verbanski was reading heavily from the book of Lynch while he was dreaming up this video that sees pools of blood, swarms of maggots, a mirror that shifts positions, a musty old well and a women falling off the edge of a cliff. In fact Lynch's stylized weirdness pops up often in this film. In Lost Highway (Lynch's most abstract work), nothing makes sense in its pure irony. Weird things happen by never without reason or cause. Here weird things happen for the sake of having weird things happen. We see unexplained flashbacks; irrational explanations and pure amazement at how much more illogical on film can stretch itself to be. The film starts off creepy in theory, things happen that are not explained or are cause for explanation, wasn't that half the fun of The Sixth Sense? Then after seeing the video, Rachel goes on the hunt for the creator. She searches for a woman only to find she had committed suicide. She the gets caught up in a strange triangle involving horses going buck wild and then dying. She then meets and odd character who works at a horse ranch who refuses to discuss the video and finally begins her search for a little girl who may or may not be dead. The problem is that none of it interconnects for form and sort of opinion of explanation into the motivation behind neither the video nor the killings. *If you have not seen this this, this is the time to stop reading* This film left me with so many questions to situations that can't possibly have simple answers that I have to wonder why such a film would even want to evoke such questions. First who made the tape and what is its purpose? What relevance did the tape have to the dead horse rancher and the little girl? If the ring itself is the light the reflects through the opening around the stone barrier that sits on top of the well how can any light get in when the stone goes to the very edge on both sides of the well? What did mass horse genocide have to do with anything in this story? Finally if the little girl didn't want to be helped then why was Rachel led to help her? The ending of the film closes in an abrupt halt that again pays homage to Lynch but doesn't execute the technique right. Lynch can end his films like that because his stories have no beginning or ending. We open in the middle of someone's life and we close in the middle of someone's life. This film clearly established a beginning during the opening, possessed no real common ground that you could call a middle and exits without an ending. This film also never wanted to end; it had so many false endings that you almost need a spreadsheet to keep track of them. Instead of clearing up any unwanted confusion the film tries to prove itself to us by throwing in loads of new facts that only make the proceedings make even less sense. When you start your career at the very top of the heap where is there to go? That is a problem that Naomi Watts faces in this film. She is a great actress but with all the glory and pure emotion awe that was presented in Mulholland Drive it is usually not smart to follow up with a film that is of the same style but of a lesser grade. Although knowing not what this film was about I will still give you my honest thoughts on what I felt was presented. We are all reflections of what we see on television. The TV is a tool used to create false awareness and manipulate our minds into seeing ourselves in different light. I believe that Rachel was a reflection of the little girl. You will notice that almost every time we see the water we also see Rachel's reflection in it. Yet that is a contradicted thought because it is my belief that this is nothing more than an attempt to shock mainstream audience with a style only made popular in cult fashion. In all of my honest glory I must say that this film did nothing for me. It never once scared or intrigued me. I felt no emotion for these characters as they themselves had none, I really must stress that weirdness is not a good substitute for characterization and ever more so, logic. If it were up to me the cover of this film would not say `the scariest film since The Sixth Sense.' It would say `the biggest disappointment since Unbreakable.'