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Hollywood is a machine. Every week, every month and every year countless films are released into theatres and not every one is as successful as the studio heads would hope. Sometimes the publicity machine was askew, sometimes the movie targeted an odd demographic, sometimes the release was steamrolled by a much larger movie and occasionally the movie is flat out bad.

But Hollywood's loss is our gain. There is a veritable treasure trove of film out there that you may not have seen. I will be your guide to this veritable wilderness of unwatched film. It will be my job to steer you towards the action, adventure, drama and comedy that may have eluded you, and at the same time, steer you away from some truly unwatchable dreck.

Hopefully we'll stumble across some entertainment that may have slid under your radar. Wish us luck.

The Cell (2000)

The Cell stars Jennifer Lopez as psychologist Catherine Deane, Vioncent D'Onofrio as schizophrenic serial killer Carl Stargher and Vince Vaughn as FBI Agent Peter Novak. The story is based around a captured yet comatose serial killer and the FBI's attempts to get information from him. The FBI doesn't know quite what to do with a felon that they can't interrogate, the Patriot Act doesn't exist yet so waterboarding is completely out of the question and they know for a fact that the killer has a victim stashed and "on the clock". In their desperation, they turn to good old fashioned police work to save the day.

I'm just kidding, naturally. Instead of using novel techniques like "evidence" and "clues" they turn to a pot smoking virtual psychologist that is currently being stymied by an eight-year-old. Undeterred by her 0 for 10 record with the eight-year-old, the FBI encourages her to wander around inside the head of a serial killer with a wild-looking virtual reality suit and experience what his brain is actually thinking. Oh, and by the way, there's a good chance that she could be killed by interacting with his mind in this way.

It's not an unfamiliar motif for a movie. A fantastic machine allows the hero and villain to enter an otherworldly realm that allows them to bend and break the rules of physics and reality to suit themselves. The only consistent rule in this little plot device is that if you die in the "fantasy" world, you die in the real world as well.





This was used to marvelous effect in The Matrix, A Nightmare on Elm Street and the 13th Floor. The Cell attempts to follow the same sort of structure, but the primary antagonist in the film is a severe schizophrenic. This amplifies the fantasy world aspect of this film so much that I began to wonder if someone had spiked my beverage as I was watching this film.

First of all, there are a number of artistic references inside the killer's mind that are quite impressive. Unfortunately, I know more about quantum physics than I do about art, so a lot of these little references didn't leave me feeling a sense of understanding. Instead, they left me feeling lost and rather confused. As the psychologist wanders farther and farther into this weird and maniacal fantasy world, a couple of gruesome themes present themselves to the audience, and you won't need a degree in art training to interpret them.

You may need a vomit bag, however. The film is pretty graphic and rather gruesome at points. Deceased and half-dead women are painted and displayed as dolls and marionettes in strange little sadomasochistic poses. A horse is bisected yet still alive in front of our heroine, and still she trudges onward as she completely ignores the ominous music in the background in true horror film fashion.

The killer himself makes himself known very shortly after she ventures deeper into his psyche, and despite the fact that he looks like a cross between an Aztec priest and Freddie Mercury, he bends her to his will almost instantly. Naturally, the FBI responds to this event rationally and responsibly by drugging the psychologist into a coma herself and then gently severing the connection between the two.

Just kidding, the FBI does nothing of the sort. Instead, Vince Vaughn jumps into a virtual reality suit of his own (Just how many of these things do they have lying around anyways?) and charges in to save her.

The movie has a pile of logical faux pas similar to this one. Characters do things that just don't make sense from any perspective. (Okay, Lopez plays her character as a pot smoking hippie, but still...) But where the movie really shines is in the way that it has its characters do stupid things and then pay for them. I mean REALLY pay for them. After Vaughn charges blindly in after Lopez, he's almost immediately caught and the killer does something...uh... let's say stomach churning to him.

All in all, this is a weird, graphic, gruesome and kind of sad story. You learn enough about Stargher during the film to see that he never really had a chance at all. He's sick, he's not in control of himself and D'Onofrio may have actually given us our best impression of what it actually feels like to be completely insane. There's a tragic ending for one of our lead characters, and even the "Hollywood" happy ending doesn't really take the bite out of it.

The Cell has flaws, it's true. There are some moments that make you slap your forehead and roll your eyes. But there are also moments where you can't tear your eyes away from the screen, no matter how much you want to. Watch this film and enjoy it, because despite its flaws, I can honestly say there is very little out there as unique as this film is.