The Black Dahlia

RATED: R for strong violence, some grisly images, sexual content and language.
RUNNING TIME: 121 MINUTES
PLOT: A fictional account of the notorious 1947 Los Angeles murder of actress Elizabeth Short and the obsession that develops for her between two cops investigating the case which destroys their lives.
STARS: Mia Kirshner (Elizabeth Short), Josh Hartnett (Bucky Bleichart), Scarlett Johansson (Kay Lake), Aaron Eckhart (Lee Blanchard), Hilary Swank (Madeleine Linscott).

Gord Burt 3.5 Stars

On January 15, 1947, Los Angeles awoke to an unimaginable crime: The torture-ravished body of a beautiful young woman named Elizabeth Short was found in a vacant lot. The discovery sparked the city’s largest manhunt, but the killer was never found. The Black Dahlia, a reference to the then-current Alan Ladd thriller, The Blue Dahlia, and the victim’s jet-black hair, was the moniker slapped on Short.

Based on James Ellroy’s novel, this film noir thriller has everything you’d expect a Brian De Palma film to contain: broads, smokes, revolvers, trench coats, and plenty of atmosphere. It’s a visually stunning genre piece that is effectively moody and authentic but is likely to lose more than one viewer in its somewhat convoluted plot structure. The complicated plot might do wonders in the book with unlimited pages, but a film 120-plus minutes is starting to go on too long while the things you have to remember keep piling up.

The cops investigating the murder become obsessed with the Black Dahlia case, but it’s Bucky, a cop, who becomes ensnared in the web of Madeleine, a coolly elegant bisexual heiress who not only resembles the dead woman but slept with her.

Josh Hartnett delivers an intriguing mix of tenderness, self-righteousness and doubt while Aaron Eckhart plays fast and loose yet never seems out of control. As the good vamp (and stunning in the period costumes), Scarlett Johansson uses her angelic pout to have her way with men, yet she’s the weakest of the cast. As the bad vamp, Swank goes for unadulterated and unrestrained sexuality though her performance almost borders on camp near the end.As decent as the rest of the cast is, only Mia Kirshner as Short creates a truly memorable character. Her tear-stained, wounded innocence, practically the only clue in the film to explaining the cops’ obsession with the case, almost gets lost in the plot, yet when the movie is over, she’s the only one who will still be on the brain.

Erin Harde 2 Stars

There seems to be a precedent for contemporary throwbacks to the film noire genre of the ‘30s and ‘40s. They must look fantastic, with the women impeccably well-kept in shocking red lipstick and elegant upswept curls, while the men are always in uniform be they sailor or cop.

The dialogue has to be slick and swift; it’s fun to listen to, but also requires some concentrating to figure out the period slang. And finally, the plot must be unnecessarily complicated.
In The Black Dahlia, there are several slimy dealings afoot but the focal point is the dead wannabe actress found disembowelled, cut in half at the waist and sliced from ear to ear. It’s gruesome and irresistible, and demands instant gratification in the form of a simple whodunit mystery. Instead, we get layer upon layer of story lines from the characters’ pasts that are minutely related to the big picture, but you have to work very hard to find out how, which really takes the fun out of what should be a completely absorbing film.

Instead of being offered a lineup of potential suspects, and being left to muse on the identity of the deranged killer, we are battered with cumbersome details to ponder and piece into the puzzle. There should be no way that Elizabeth Short, the Dahlia, a beautiful, if morose, actress, should ever be forgotten. But her corpse is buried under a paper trail of red herrings and skeletons in the closet. It hardly sets up the big moment when the murderer is revealed.

To its credit, The Black Dahlia looks fabulous along with everyone in it. Scarlett Johansson and Hilary Swank play off each other as the damsel in distress and the femme fatale, right down to their hair colour. Swank’s character, a darkly twisted heiress, is always suspect, especially when she admits to having a tryst with the Dahlia because she wanted to make love to someone who looked like her. Among her haunts is a lesbian lounge where k.d. Lang makes a cameo appearance.

Josh Hartnett and Aaron Eckhart get the job done, but it’s the women that really keep the movie interesting even when the plot isn’t worth following.

The Covenant

RATED: PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, some disturbing images, sexual content, partial nudity and language.
RUNNING TIME: 98 MINUTES
PLOT: In 1692, in the Ipswich Colony of Massachusetts, five families with untold power formed a covenant of silence. One family, lusting for more, was banished; their bloodline disappearing without a trace, until now. As descendants of the original families who settled in Ipswich Colony, four young boys have all been born with special powers. When the body of a dead student is discovered after a party, secrets begin to unravel which threaten to break the covenant of silence that has protected their families for hundreds of years.
STARS: Steven Strait (Caleb), Taylor Kitsch (Pogue), Toby Hemingway (Reid), Laura Ramsey (Sarah).

Gord Burt 2.5 Stars

At first glance The Covenant looks like a new series on WB. With generically handsome teen boys driving fast cars, spooky mood lighting, a hot nubile blonde in distress (and her undies), it looked like the pitch was something along the line of Dawson’s Creek meets Charmed.

The premise is sound enough, so how bad could The Covenant be then? The answer: Not as bad as it could have been. Unfortunately, it’s not all that good, either, especially if you’re nitpicky about things like dialogue and, you know, plot and pesky things like that.

The kids are your usual collection of stereotypes: the alpha male, the tough biker, the smooth-talker and the quiet one (think Ringo). There’s a lot of furrowed brows and assurances of "I've got your back, bro" male bonding and testosterone, but instead of playing video games and doing homework like most kids, these guys jump off of cliffs, cast puke spells on bullies and disappear in their vehicle while fleeing from cops.

Unfortunately the hideously stereotyped girls fare even worse as they live only for boys (except, instead of curlers and pajama parties, they take late-night showers and lounge in their underwear) and dance erotically to songs in a bar.

The guys may look like male models, but they have inherited awesome, if shadowy nondescript, powers. The drawback: The more you use the magic, the faster you age. At just 44, Caleb’s father looks like the portrait of Dorian Gray. It’s too bad the batch of interchangeable heroes inspire no empathy. Entitled, ungrateful twits aren’t endearing; they’re just slightly more likeable than an entitled, ungrateful, evil twit.

The Covenant has excellent special effects, but it is strikingly lacking in suspense. The final showdown between two warlock boys throwing balls of energy at each other resembles a Mortal Kombat-esque fight staged in what appears to be Smallville’s barn.

The ending is left open for a sequel, and the studio commissioned a four-issue comic book prequel being published by Image Comics, so obviously they were hoping to turn this into a franchise. So why, then, is it so darn sloppy?

Erin Harde 2 Stars

In a silver screen metaphor for the consequences of drug use, The Covenant is about the dire fates faced by those who "use." It could only be more obvious if you inserted crystal meth or crack every time they said "powers."

In this instance, it isn’t literally drug addicts who are warned, but four wealthy young men who don’t respect the addictive nature of their powers handed down through the generations. Some are reckless with their gifts; either they beat on each other, drive off cliffs or create gusts of winds at opportune times. The scenes where they abuse their powers are the best in the movie.

The rest of the movie is cluttered with cheesy thriller cliches, and you have to give the creators credit for being able to cram in so many within such a short time. There’s the aftermath of a bush party gone wrong - a dead teen. Then there’s the beautiful blonde girl who is a new student at the high-end boarding school. Her name is barely uttered before she’s in the shower washing her silky blonde locks. Then the lights go out, and instead of racing back to her dorm room like a normal human being, she investigates in her tiny towel.

There’s also the villain who’s out for blood without a solid motive. The story goes that there were five blood lines of Ipswich, but the fifth was snuffed out at the stake during the Salem witch trials. As one might predict, the fifth line turns out to be alive and very grumpy. The fifth’s bitterness at having to go through the change without any guidance is on par with Stephen King’s Carrie. Essentially, the boy is just bitter because he didn’t get to be part of the gang. The writers don’t even seem convinced this is enough because they also make him deranged with the need for more power.

Even with a decent plot, there’s too much preaching and too many eye rollers for The Covenant to be saved from the stake.

The Wicker Man

RATED: PG-13 for disturbing images and violence, language and thematic issues.
RUNNING TIME: 102 MINUTES
PLOT: A sheriff investigating the disappearance of a young girl from a small island discovers there’s a larger mystery to solve among the island’s secretive, neo-pagan community.
STARS: Nicholas Cage (Detective Edward Malus), Kate Beahan (Willow), Ellen Burstyn (Sister Summersisle).

Gord Burt 1 Star

The tagline for The Wicker Man is "Some Sacrifices Must Be Made." Unfortunately, it means you sacrifice 102 minutes of your life which, you eventually realize, is totally wasted on this needless and unremarkable remake.

Writer/director Neil Labute takes us through an unacceptably meaningless plot that can be predicted within the first 15 to 20 minutes. The dialogue is supposed to be mysterious and intrigue us, but just ends up being a mockery.

One mistake Labute makes is moving the story from the fringes of the British Isles (where the original takes place) to the Pacific Northwest. One might accept the remnants of an old Druid cult surviving on a remote Scottish island, but not off the coast of Washington.

The film is refreshingly not-in-your-face, achieving most of its tension through slowly mounting unease rather than the raw gore favoured by most of today’s shlock-fests. The problems mount though as the muffled atmosphere of suppression is intriguing at first, but soon becomes tedious as we wait for the payoffs and scares that never come. So what do the filmmakers do? They add shock cuts to placate focus groups who demand more excitement.

The film is manipulative, shamelessly exploitative, and gives a world view where trust and human companionship are evils to be feared. Not only that, the absurdities continue to mount as the picture goes on; for example, one would assume Edward would have time to ask Willow why the rest of the town refuses to acknowledge her daughter’s existence yet he never does.

The biggest challenge for the audience may be holding back laughter as Summersisle is revealed to be the Island of Awful Acting. Oscar winner Nicholas Cage (he should be grateful the Academy can’t take his statue back after this) works overtime, using his entire repertoire of tics, twitches and grimaces as he pours intensity into Malus, but he can’t make Malus seem like more than an inept twit nor does he make the audience care for him. Even the usually dependable Leelee Sobieski is bland and boring as a sexy bar maid.

For the good of everyone, someone should have burned this new Wicker Man at the stake, using the script as kindling. Don’t let the big stars fool you; this remake is as rotten as they come and not worth your time.

Erin Harde 3 Stars

If radical feminists were able to rewrite Puritan history, it might transpire similarly to The Wicker Man. In what looks like a scene from a Hawthorne novel, this is a new take on the Salem witch trials.

The colony of Summersisle resembles a reclusive 17th-century community with land that is sowed and harvested by hand. The children wear pinafores and attend school in a one-room building, and the residents fiercely follow the traditions of their ancestors despite living in the 21st century. While they follow a strict way of living similar to the Amish or Hutterites, the colonists subscribe to pagan beliefs, the kind that would have landed them on the stake in Colonial times. That’s because women rule this colony. Men are subservient and used as labourers.

It is at the beginning of a pagan ritual Nicholas Cage’s Edward Malus enters the picture. Surprisingly, Cage is abysmal in the role; perhaps he’s unsure of how to handle what an arrogant jerk the character is, but he overacts all the way through the movie. The director has brilliantly made this character into a composite of all man’s worst qualities. He is belligerent, violent and in the end, completely helpless.

One could make the argument the director paints the women of Summersisle as conniving, manipulative harpies, but chances are, the female contingent in the audience are going to have a good laugh when Ellen Burstyn’s Sister Summersisle daintily quips "men serve a very important purpose here - for breeding."

Malus is there to find the whereabouts of a missing girl and they mislead him at every turn, including his ex-fiancee, who invited him to the eerie island. At times, it’s possible to sympathize with his situation, especially because he witnessed a horrific car accident that claimed the life of a little girl - a scene that seems irrelevant to the rest of the movie. But his approach to the investigation and conversations with the women are loathsome. As the movie goes on, it’s much easier to support the women, who are beautiful, intelligent, and self-sufficient, and Malus resorts to brute force. The ending is horrific and yet strangely satisfying. It’s like Misery meets the little girl from Firestarter.

Despite an intriguing plot, Cage’s poor acting and the disjointed storytelling should discourage a trip to the theatre. Unless you have, shall we say, a burning desire to see it.