"That's a nice-a donut."
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
The Skeleton Key (2005)
The Skeleton Key is one of the better films in the thriller/suspense/horror genre in a relatively weak year for scary movies. It starts out as one of those seemingly-predictable films where you think one person is going to turn out to be a "bad guy", but then you think that was just a red herring and they;re really good, but then they eventually turn out to be bad after all. And it manages to pull it off ...for the most part.
A spooky atmosphere pervades throughout the Key. And there are plenty of other hallmarks (read: cliches) of successful suspense pictures too. For instance, it seems to rain every night there, with perfect warm sunny daylight hours. But the voodoo-tinged atmosphere (or hoodoo as the case may be) mostly serves as an attempt to conceal a plot that isn't all that scary or thrilling until the very last act. Which is to say that the movie, which is mildly entertaining but rather ho-hum for the bulk of it, is redeemed by a very good ending.
Down in Louisiana, Caroline (Kate Hudson) is a young nursing aide at a retirement home in New Orleans (a city which, for better or worse, is only featured briefly in the movie). One day she decides to pursue another opportunity and gets a job at an historic, stately home along the bayou being the personal aide for an elderly man. Ben (John Hurt) is an invalid who doesn't talk and can't walk and is mainly just living out his remaining days with his wife Violet (Gena Rowlands). Caroline is given an old master skeleton key that unlocks any door in the large house, but is gravely warned by Violet to stay away from the secret locked room in the attic. The fourth main character is Luke (Peter Sarsgaard), an attorney who is handling the estate and who befriends Caroline. Gradually Caroline comes to suspect that something is terribly amiss there, especially when Ben begins to give her eerie vibes and signals that something is wrong.
Hudson - who has seen a downturn in her critical success ever since her peak in Almost Famous - is good, and has very good rapport with Hurt, who is even better in a role with almost no sounds or speech. In fact, the interaction between their characters is so well done that I would have preferred more scenes of Caroline caring for Ben; it would have given even more impact to the eventual ending. But one thing that didn't have a great impact was the concept of hoodoo in general. By itself it's more of a curiosity than anything to be afraid of. But director Iain Softley and the filmmakers were able to get around this somewhat by using some eerie flashbacks of a hoodoo ceremony at the estate during the early 1920s that went very wrong.
In the end some people will enjoy the twisty finale, while others may find it too contrived or nonsensical. Clearly though, you're overall opinion of Skeleton Key will be directly related to how you feel about the way it ends. I see a nice comparison with The Sixth Sense - an okay solid movie with a big surprise, which I ultimately found disappointing. In this case, we have an okay solid movie with a big surprise, which more than makes the whole worthwhile.
The Verdict: B.
Michael Bentley 11:51 AM
Archives
March 2005
April 2005
May 2005
June 2005
July 2005
August 2005
September 2005
October 2005
November 2005
December 2005
January 2006
February 2006
March 2006
April 2006
May 2006
June 2006
July 2006
August 2006
September 2006
|
|
|
|
