Julianne Moore and Jonathan Rhys Meyers star in this eerie chiller from the producer of The Ring and the writer of Identity and it’s a very effective supernatural thriller.
Cara Jessup (Moore), who describes herself as a doctor of science but a woman of faith, is a criminal psychologist whose expert and respected views on multiple personality disorders in several high profile murder cases, has resulted in the death sentence. Despite witnessing her husband’s murder whilst walking home from church on Christmas Eve, she is unwilling to give up on God, even although her young daughter Sammy and her father already have.
Following another high profile case, Cara receives a phone call from her father, a respected psychologist himself, who wants her opinion on a new patient of his. She begrudgingly obliges and what she encounters will shatter her beliefs and her family. David (Meyers) was found by the police, taken to hospital and eventually sent for psych evaluation. Everything seems pretty routine until Cara’s father phones through to the evaluation room and asks David if Adam is there. It soon becomes clear that David is far from ordinary as he inhabits multiple personalities and they are all murder victims. As Cara tries to disprove his MPD, it soon becomes clear that something far more sinister is at work.
I really enjoyed this film. It’s a bit of a slow burner but it is chock full of character development, atmosphere and is driven by a compelling story. Moore and Meyers are well cast and are backed up by a solid supporting cast including Jeffrey DeMunn, Nathan Corddry and Frances Conroy.
The film looks great. There are lots of moody, atmospheric shots with lots of dark blues, browns and greens present. The editing is well handled with minimal use of jump cutting and booming sound effects (thankfully) and the whole affair seems to have been created with good intentions.
OVERALL SUMMARY
A well crafted film which takes its time to tell us its story. I’m glad it didn’t pander to teenagers and try to be PG-13 CGI scary. It might not do terribly well in cinemas due to its low key nature, but I hope it finds a larger audience on DVD later this year, as I feel it’s well worth a look.
