There’s the unusual show of restraint too but that doesn’t
mean it’s a slow burn. There isn’t a
build up necessarily to some giant event at the end. Instead we tend to see the aftermath of a
bunch of nasty shit and left to wonder exactly how it all went down. I really dig this approach because it’s the
ol’ your imagination can dream up something far worse than what they can show
you on screen. And in fact when they do
present us a murder outright it feels out of place.
Unfortunately the movie’s not that good overall though. Julia Roberts’ (Conspiracy Theory) acting has been criticized a fair deal in this
but I think she does a pretty good job as the incredibly timid and generally
frightened of the world servant who has to endure all of the shit her employer
throws at her. Really it’s John
Malkovich (Con Air) as Jekyll and
Hyde who doesn’t pull off either role. As
Jekyll he’s too distant and monotone while as Hyde he’s like an irritating
prepubescent brat. Plus when he’s Hyde
he looks like Tommy Wiseau (Johnny from The
Room) and acts like just as much of a dick so that doesn’t help.
Another issue is Jekyll switches to Hyde and vice versa so
much that by the end the idea loses substantial power. Instead of “oh no who’s it gonna be this
time, I’m on the edge of my seat” it’s “oh no it’s this asshole Hyde again, I’m
gonna grab a snack”. All of the
transformations are done off screen (accompanied by terrible stock library
sound effects) which you might think is a gyp but considering the one
transformation we do get involves awful dated as hell CGI I’m ok with it.
But the biggest problem with this picture is there’s no real
sense of moving forward. Having this be
more of a romance than a horror film is fine but Mary Reilly and Henry Jekyll
never get together or even attempt to.
It’s not that they long to be together and Hyde is tearing them apart,
it’s that they go from scene to scene making no headway in a relationship they seemingly
both want. They don’t make any moves
because Reilly is too reticent and Jekyll thinks he has a better chance of
boning her as Hyde for some reason. It’s
frustrating because we know what Mary sees in Jekyll but he can’t see it
himself. It turns out she has a way too
on the nose backstory involving a drunk, abusive and possibly incestuous father
(Michael Gambon (Toys)) who
apparently was a nice guy sober but a horrid sonuvabitch when sauced. Get it?
Like Jekyll and Hyde you stupid boobs.
On the other side we have no idea what Jekyll sees in Mary. Is it purely looks? Her vast knowledge of housework? I guess we’ll never know.
The idea of telling this story from the point of view of
Jekyll’s servant is a cool one though. She
and the rest of the help know bizarre and eerie shit is going down in the house
but only get scant clues. They’re
witnessing this unbelievable medical miracle in glimpses up close so the threat
is imminent, not a safe distance away. This
viewpoint makes a lot of sense because it’s a classic way to convey a horror
plot. Don’t follow the monster around
constantly but rather see how the monster affects other people’s lives.
And just to sprinkle a little more positive in here towards
the end I would say my favorite performance is definitely Glenn Close (Air Force One) as the Madam of a
brothel. She’s so good at the brassy
dame attitude and has complete command of any scene she’s in. They made her face ghostly pale with beaming
red lipstick so she pops out at you. She
puts on a nice thick British accent too which John Malkovich doesn’t even
bother with. Close isn’t in the movie
very much, a paltry three scenes, but when we get her she’s fantastic.
One other thing of note is the filmmakers went against the
mini trend at the time of making more faithful and somewhat realistic adaptations
of classic horror books. But Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Branagh’s Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein were bombs
so when “Jekyll and Hyde” came up Hollywood probably had second thoughts and recalibrated
their formula (pure speculation on my part, I have nothing to back this up). Funny enough Mary Reilly is actually based on a book as well of the same
title. The author, Valerie Martin,
turned the old time horror tale into a tawdry romance story and goddamn if you
step back for a sec that’s what this really is, isn’t it? Man that sounds pretty awful when you say it
out loud. But the real question is how
faithful is this adaptation of Martin’s novel?
The real answer is I don’t really care.
So this one has a decent amount of good points but also too
many bad points. Stephen Frears (The Queen, High Fidelity) made a
beautiful looking movie with visuals that have stuck with me all these years but
it’s mainly that the script doesn’t work.
Neither does the extremely bland title.
Unless you’re a big time horror buff there’s no need to see this.
No comments:
Post a Comment