Let's Not Listen: Film and TV reviews

You Kill Me

Forget everything that Cops has taught you – according to John Dahl's You Kill Me, drinking and homicide actually don't mix. At least not when you're Frank Falenczyk, an alcoholic hit man who once prided himself on his murderly precision. When his Buffalo-based gangster family forces him to go to San Francisco and dry up, Frank resists, but eventually takes the 12 steps to heart. Particularly the one about making amends: “I don't regret killing them,” Frank tells his girlfriend of the victims he's listing on paper. “Just killing them badly.” And so, the next of kin of the woman whose eye he sliced instead of her throat gets a $50 gift certificate to Macy's.

The monster-with-a-sensitive side premise has obviously been done before, whether mined for laughs (Analyze This, -That) or melodrama (The Sopranos). Here, the premise is spun as nearly intolerably cute. Ben Kingsley's Frank isn't a sexy beast, but a compact, well-dressed package of charming tics and few, funny words. He's initially appalled by the AA meetings he attends but is soon sharing 'n' caring, and when he meets Laurel (Tea Leoni), a – naturally – beautiful Californian whose tongue is as sharp as his knives, she wants to love him but, darn it, she's got boundary issues. They meet, by the way, in a funeral home: Frank was strong-armed into taking a temporary job as an embalmer, and one day he was working on Laurel's stepfather when she brought in bowling shoes for the deceased to wear. Now that's a story to tell your grandkids.

Thanks to a delicately woven, genre-crossing script by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (who, in a departure, also worked together on The Chronicles of Narnia) and the strength of its leads, You Kill Me keeps its potential wackiness in check. (Though the Polishness – and drunkenness – of Buffalonians is emphasized so heavily that the city, represented by Winnipeg, becomes caricatured character itself.) Much of its humor is culled from Frank's AA experiences, whether its his  introduction to the process (his look of subtle alarm every time someone introduces himself and is quickly accosted with “Hi, [Blank]” is terrific), his blossoming candor (“The only way I'm going to get to [kill] again is to stop drinking”), or the members who share their stories (“You know, it's a whole lot easier fucking girls you don't like when you're drunk”). The film doesn't exclusively poke fun, however: There's a quite uncomfortable scene where a merry family at the funeral home, laughing the whole time, is trying to force a drink on Frank, as well as heartbreaking consequences whenever he does give in.

Kingsley is a font of dryness as Frank, making the character bug-eyed and uncomfortable in his own skin when he's sober. His exquisite comic timing and expressiveness is impressively matched by Leoni, who on more than one occasion makes too-sly jokes work by a great physical follow-through. (Also notable is Bill Pullman as a real-estate agent/babysitter, schlubby in an ill-fitting raincoat and bad haircut and tasked with watching Frank when he looks like he can barely keep it together himself.) And just when their scenes together start to get too lovey, the filmmakers know how to cut the sugar: The expected new-couple montage, for example, features shots of them practicing knife-wielding on a head-shaped watermelon. 

You Kill Me doesn't completely abandon its gangster roots, though, while it's vacationing as a romantic comedy. There's tension and violence as Frank's family deals with a rival that the hit man had failed to whack  because he was drunk; Dahl, who also balanced similar moods in The Last Seduction, switches between locations and plot lines smoothly. The only surprise as the pieces come together is that you'll likely have enjoyed the movie more than you might have thought.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

Brooklyn Rules

The creators of Brooklyn Rules abided largely by only one: that if anything mob-related was popular enough to become cliche, it was good enough for their movie. The film opens in a church as the main character narrates, talking about his boyhood in the titular borough and how it affected him and his two best buds as they grew up. Fast forward to 1985, when one's working in a butcher shop and going to college, one's a bumbling, directionless innocent, and one's flirting with the local family. Cue conversations about whether being feared is the same as being respected, as well as plenty of whatsa-matta-you banter full of “da”s, “foockin'”s, and “douchebag”s. 

Alarmingly, this amateurish telling was written by Terence Winter, a veteran Sopranos scribe, who apparently saved his first-draft for the big screen. Alec Baldwin is billed as a star, but his slightly over-the-top but effective turn as a boss is minor as the kids are allowed to run the show.  Freddie Prinze Jr. is Michael, the cartoonishly accented, responsible lead character who's studying pre-law and adjusts his personality for his WASPy classmates and Brooklyn friends accordingly. Michael has big dreams but tries to keep his lives separate, confessing in voice-over that “in my neighborhood, it was better to keep ambitions like water polo to yourself” and acting reluctant when his buddies want to accompany him to a party in the city for Ellen (Mena Suvari), a fellow student Michael's trying to date. (For good reason: The mixing doesn't go so well.)

Meanwhile, baby-faced Bobby (Jerry Ferrara) is religious and good-natured, wanting nothing more than to start working for the Post Office so he and his squeeze can settle down. Carmine (Ocean Thirteen's Scott Caan) is the troublemaker: Smart but vain – both about his looks and in feeling indestructible – he begins doing small jobs for Caesar (Baldwin), seeing it as the only agreeable way to make a good living in his 'hood. He dismisses Michael's concerns. Of course, trouble is waiting, and  Carmine's antics start to involve his two friends as well.

The three young actors do have a likable presence onscreen, but Michael Corrente directs them to extreme Brooklyn-isms – such as those awful accents -- that make the work at times skirt parody. The film is interesting mostly when it integrates the real-life rise of John Gotti with Carmine's story, and its inevitable tragedy is heartbreaking, even if you see it coming from practically the start. But like the mob life, none of its perks is enough to make Brooklyn Rules worthwhile.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

Crazy Love

"Dinner, dancing, and -- if things go well -- disfigurement!"

The decades-spanning story told in Crazy Love isn't the type of headline-grabber you'd currently read about in, say, Us Weekly – because this one is actually true. Burt Pugach and Linda Riss are the subjects of Dan Klores' documentary (co-directed by Fisher Stevens), a couple who first made the papers in 1959 and, excepting this movie, have continued to do so until as recently as 1996. Their relationship has been publicly defined by betrayal, obsession, violence, and a stranger-than-fiction ending. Now Klores is betting that viewers can shrug off the luridness of the saga and be entertained by the wackiness of how these two Bronx natives ended up together.

Both of them appear in Crazy Love to narrate their story, accompanied by old photos, archival footage, and shots of an old-school, glamorous New York. Burt was a wealthy ambulance-chaser  in his early 30s when he spotted Linda, a 20-year-old beauty, sitting on a bench in 1957. As he says now, he “had to have her” -- a sentiment that'll be repeated frequently, by Burt as well as other commentators – and struck up a conversation. Linda humored him but was far from enamored: “I thought he was very weird,” she says in her gravely Bronx accent. “I probably gave him my phone number just to get rid of him.” She began to feel differently, though, when Burt showed her the good life, which included socializing at his nightclub, flying in his private plane, and generally living like stars. “I believe that Burt fell in love with Linda,” a friend of hers says. “I believe that Linda was impressed with Burt.”

They remained a couple until '59, when Linda found out that her fawning boyfriend was married. He promised to divorce his wife, even going to far as to fabricate papers. But that was finally enough for  Linda to kick him to the curb. She began dating someone else and got engaged. Burt was desperate to get her back. When she refused, he hired a few goons to go to her home and throw lye in her face. (Though he claims he wanted merely “to beat her up.”) Linda was disfigured and almost completely blinded. Burt went to jail after a circus of a trial in which he acted as his own lawyer, tried repeatedly to delay proceedings, and even slit his wrists in an attempt to use an insanity plea. Linda claims that at that time, “If someone told me Burt was dead, I would have said, 'Wonderful.'”

Then, in 1974, Burt and Linda became husband and wife.

That's hardly a spoiler, as there are plenty of other tabloid-worthy twists that occur during Burt's incarceration as well as after they'd wed. The now-elderly pair seem to enjoy giving a play-by-play here and are, admittedly, engrossing: Linda, with giant Liz Taylor hair and flashy sunglasses, seems a tough, colorful, no-nonsense type, expressing with her eyebrows and drags of her long cigarette what her eyes cannot. Burt, meanwhile, is more of a mystery. In a suit with a white goatee and glasses, Burt looks and even sounds – at least if you weren't listening closely to his words – like a smart former businessman and playboy who's still sharp at 80. But when he casually relates his lies and wrongdoings, from his affairs to his negligence practices to his assault on  Linda, Burt is coolly detached and matter-of-fact. There's debate in the film over the state of his mental health. Though some of the interview subjects dismiss the idea that he's a psychopath, journalist Jimmy Breslin claims, “Nobody is as visibly insane as Burton Pugach.”

It's a tough call, especially considering that the couple are clearly happy to categorize their disturbed history as simply a wild ride. They bicker and putter around like most pairs who've known each other 50 years, and unlike dirt-digging documentaries such as 2003's Capturing the Friedmans, Crazy Love tries as hard as its subjects to make light of the story's unsettling elements. Sensational headlines from old papers are shown, as well as photos of Burt looking wild-eyed as he's escorted to prison. But one buddy of his laughs about Burt's life (“They say even Hitler had friends – whaddya gonna do?”) and the young Linda appears to be having the time of her life after the incident, traveling around the world and picking up suitors despite her handicap. (At least until she was comfortable enough to take off the sunglasses – Linda concedes that she married Burt partly because she was “damaged goods.”) Worse, though, is the film's soundtrack: Buddy Clark's “Linda” gets a pass, especially considering Burt constantly had it played for her. But “Poison Ivy?” “You Really Got a Hold on Me?”  “Burning Love?!”

It's difficult, too, not to take the central issues of stalking and domestic violence and put them in today's context. After Linda was injured, for example, she received 24-hour police protection – how often does that happen now? Theirs also is no longer such a unique story; obviously many women still decide to stay with their abusers, usually with not-so-cheerful results. And, of course, though the main message here is supposed to be the adaptability of humans willing to compartmentalize emotions to serve their best interests, the subtext is that if you harass and even harm an estranged love interest, you'll eventually win that person back. Crazy Love does, however, encourage the idea that sometimes first impressions are best heeded: When Burt introduced himself, Linda says, “I looked at him like he was a nut.” 

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

Severance

Not another meeting!

Severance is the story of terrible things that couldn't have happened to funnier people. British writer-director Christopher Smith's second film (after 2004's Creep) is a horror movie that thinks it's a comedy. But it's not a straight-up joke machine like Shaun of the Dead. Nor is it parodic, like the Scream series. Think more along the lines of what you'd get if the gang from The Office schlepped to the forest for a team-building weekend, only to discover that their bumbling boss may have very well led them to their deaths.

The opening-credits scene that pairs the bouncy oldie “Ichychoo Park” with an image of blood pouring over the face of a man hanging upside-down is the first sign that Severence is going to be a bit different. The film then backs up to introduce six eye-rolling pawns and their manager. They're from the European branch of Palisade Defence, an international weapons firm, and they're unenthusiastically headed toward a lodge in Hungary when a tree branch across a main road prevents their bus from delivering them to the accommodations. The reactions vary: The uptight Harris (Toby Stephens) just wants to go back to the hotel. Butt-kisser Gordon (Andy Nyman) thinks this is great opportunity to begin to work on working together. Maggie (Laura Harris), Jill (Claudie Blakley), and Billy (Babou Cessay) give up on trying to convince their boss, Richard (Tim McInnerny), that his map is worthless and agree to follow him on foot. Steve (Danny Dyer) is high off his ass and doesn't care what's going on. He claims to have seen someone in the woods, but the others imagine that he's seeing lots of things and ignore him.

The employees lose even more team spirit when they discover that their “luxury” lodge is just a dump, despite Richard's pathetic attempts to rouse them with tropes such as “I can't spell 'success' without 'u' – and you and you and you!” (“There's only one 'u' in 'success,'” someone responds.) With nothing better to do, a few of them offer up ghost stories: The lodge was once an asylum, where the patients murdered the doctors. Or a prison for war criminals, against whom Palisade weapons were used. All of them – well, most of them – fancy themselves too smart to really believe any of the theories. But when Harris and Jill wander about the next day to look for a cell-phone signal and find their bus crashed and the driver dead in a non-accidental way, panic sets in.

Smith and co-writer James Moran hold off until past the halfway mark to really bring on the bloodshed, which the director makes selectively graphic instead of dripping each scene in gore. Even now there are bits of humor – such as an aftereffect of a decapitation that was foreshadowed in earlier bickering – but the slasher element is primary. The action is the usual cat-and-mouse, but there's one important difference that separates Severance from most like company: From the spineless boss to the bitter smartass to the class clown, the dryly comic interactions that came before the chase warm you to these characters. They're familiar, entertaining people, not cliched targets, so you're actually invested by the time the killing comes around. If nothing else, Severance will make you realize that even if surrounded
by people who drive you crazy, your worst day at the office isn't really all that bad.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

Bug

   

At least it's not herpes

Bug originated as a piece of theater – and arguably continues to be one. Tracy Letts' adaptation of her own play, directed by The Exorcist's William Friedkin, will bore the hell out of anyone approaching it as a, well, movie. Especially one of the horror variety: “Experimental” is the description that sticks to Bug best, and though it's got shades of other far-out fare such as the work of David Cronenberg, the material is so deliberately paced and deeply psychological that it nearly requires little more than a black box to be truly engaging.

Ashley Judd, puffy-eyed and without makeup, stars as Agnes, an Oklahoma barmaid who's living in run-down motel. Agnes' social life consists of drinking alone and getting crank calls from her estranged husband, Jerry (Harry Connick Jr.), who recently got out of jail. Jerry eventually shows his face to make threats and push her around, but she doesn't worry too much, because the night before a friend introduced her to Peter (Michael Shannon). Peter's weird stare matches his weird conversation -- “They want you to know they're there,” he says of “machines” that whir in the night – but because he has nowhere to go, Agnes allows him to crash on the couch. Love comes to town. So do bugs.

Allegedly, at least. Letts' story is ultimately an extreme cautionary tale about how a little bit of passion can make you do magnificently fucked-up things. Agnes at first can't see the critters that Peter claim are biting him in bed. (Aphids, he declares them, after patiently explaining the lunatic-recognized differences between fleas, lice, ticks, and the like.) But soon she feels them, too, and believes Peter when he confides that the military actually planted the bugs in his blood. Now it becomes the two of them against the world: Agnes accuses her friend, R.C. (Lynn Collins), of turning on her when R.C. insists that Peter is bad news, and she buys that the motel manager is part of a conspiracy when he claims no other rooms have reported insect problems. The couple barricade themselves and develop a logic all their own.

Even if you approach the film with a made-for-stage mindset, Bug has its problems. Letts seems to have devoted the majority of her effort toward developing Peter, and the character is terrific – his initial social awkwardness borders on the autistic, and the tangles of theories he slowly lets Agnes know are clouding his head are paranoid-schizophrenic intricate. You like him, though, because the complexity of his thoughts first makes him seem smart. And the way he patiently explains them to his backwoods girlfriend without talking down? Compared to the brutish Jerry, Agnes has found a prince. But the attention to Peter makes the rest of the work suffer: Mainly, Agnes catches crazy too fast. Though the character has a psychological crack waiting to bust open – she and Jerry had a son, who disappeared when she took him grocery shopping 10 years ago – her spiral into psycho-shrillness is unbelievably instantaneous. Letts doesn't help her her anti-heroine any by stuffing words into her mouth, with one monologue in particular running an excruciating length.

Judd's performance is manic and raw; you may dismiss Agnes as silly, but the sweet-faced actress is uncharacteristically intense. Shannon, however, is the film's redeemer as he reprises the role he originated on stage. His wide-set eyes first offset his strong, squared jaw and suggest his Peter's merely a gentle giant. Later, though, the madness in Shannon's expression combines with the drying blood all over Peter's wound-covered body to give the impression of a monster. It's this character, not the presence of creepy-crawlies, that provides the true horror in Bug. The problem is that you may have to  mentally strip away the cinema to see it.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

 

Mr. Brooks

The things I do for a paycheck...

Can you take Crash Davis seriously as a bad guy? Kevin Costner, so good at inhabiting characters from baseball players to...baseball players, tries to find his dark side in Mr. Brooks, writer-director Bruce A. Evans' thriller about a man who isn't quite what he seems to be: A righteous citizen and family man, Mr. Brooks also turns out to be Mr. Serial Killer.

In Costner's hands, though, he's more like a big meanie with a petulant scowl, OCD tendencies, and pretty good aim. We even get an additional actor (William Hurt) to play Brooks' shoulder-devil, helpfully sparing Costner from having to project too much inner malevolence. Hurt's performance as the goading Marshall -- "Why do you fight it?" he asks in a deliciously evil rumble -- is the best thing about the movie. The character himself, though, wears out his welcome (really, does no one notice Brooks talking to himself?), as does Evans' and co-writer Raymond Gideon's contrived plot.

When the story begins, the serenity-prayer-spouting Brooks has been attending AA meetings for a couple of years, trying to control his "addiction." But as an opening placard ridiculously warns, "The hunger has returned to Mr. Brooks' brain!" He's been following a young couple and decides to go for a last hurrah, meticulously planned and executed in a manner that the authorities have come to expect from the so-called "Thumbprint Killer." Assigned to the case is Detective Tracy Atwood (Demi Moore), a -- guess what? -- headstrong woman who "can't ask for help," even though she's going through a draining divorce and dealing with the escape of another murderer she'd put behind bars. After he's gotten the urge out of his system, Brooks' life gets complicated as well. One, an amateur photographer (Dane Cook) happened to see him in the couple's apartment and snapped a picture -- and is so excited by it that he wants to learn to kill, too. And two, Brooks' daughter (Danielle Panabaker) appears to have an issue of her own, which is supposed to be, uh, deadly serious but will more likely give you a good laugh.

Mr. Brooks' somewhat intriguing premise is marred by cheap scares, unbelievable plot points, and a rather sickening attitude, mostly courtesy of Cane's usually pouty character, who yelps "Yes! You are the man!" after he watches his mentor murder again. Costner's not the man here, but he's far from the worst part of the film -- which may be Mr. Brooks' most unbelievable twist.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

Red Road

For much of Red Road, the protagonist's emotional stability is in question. Jackie (Kate Dickie) is a Glasgow security guard, keeping eye on the city via its closed-circuit TV setup. The job is usually as monotonous as her reclusive life – occasionally a dog or a couple going at it on the monitors will make her smile, but mostly it's zooming in on a whole lot of nothing. She receives a visual slap, though, when she spots a man she recognizes and becomes obsessed with following him, both with the cameras and, more dangerously it seems, on foot.

Oscar-winning short-film writer-director Andrea Arnold makes her feature debut here. Red Road is the first of a trilogy concept in which three new filmmakers are given descriptions of the same main characters (by Anders Thomas Jensen and Lone Scherfig) and asked to fashion a story connecting them. Both Red Road leads, Dickie and Tony Curran (who plays Clyde, the mystery man) will appear in all the movies.

The British Arnold got the series off on a good start. Red Road is cryptic and eerily quiet as Jackie goes about her days. Very little information is given about Clyde: We know he's been in prison, and we know Jackie is disturbed that he's out. As she skulks around corners and holds her head down while trailing him, it increasingly seems as if Jackie has lost her damn mind. Her obsession while on the job becomes so consuming that she misses the stabbing of a young girl because she was fixated on Clyde. Off duty, she's willing to so deeply enter the danger zone that she even talks to Clyde's friends and attends one of his parties, the details of which she pieced together in her spying. The only glimpse of Jackie's personal life is through an invitation to a wedding, which we find out is her sister-in-law's. What can only be her father-in-law – obviously both are former – has a strained relationship with Jackie, and it's because, well, she knows why.

The few supporting characters in Red Road are seedy, adding to the film's bleak tone. There's Jackie's hit-and-run boyfriend, who takes her out into a field in his truck for 10-minute dates that she doesn't seem too happy about. We spend the most time, though, with Clyde's hotheaded fuckup friend, Stevie (Martin Compston) and Stevie's spaced-out girlfriend, April (Nathalie Press). Stevie steals Jackie's purse, gets into bar fights, and spends the whole day drinking, loudening the alarm that she should stay the hell out of Clyde's world. (The fact that Dickie looks a good 10 years older than these two as well only makes their interactions more uncomfortable.)

Dickie is understated and natural as Jackie, but Curran is a particularly inspired choice for Clyde. A curly redhead with a bit of a baby face, the actor looks more like a frat boy than a typical movie villain. It's all tantalizingly misleading, and though you'll probably figure out the story before its end, Red Road is satisfying nonetheless. And don't scoff at the film's subtitles: It may seem ridiculous to translate accented English, but considering the thick brogues, it actually turns out to be a relief to have only one mystery to solve.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

28 Weeks Later

"Avon lady!"

28 Weeks Later is horrific, gross, and intense from beginning to end. It's also depressing as hell. The sequel to the 2002 British hit 28 Days Later borrows the dark tone from Danny Boyles' apocalyptic nightmare and adds another coat of bleak. The focus is no longer on the survivors of a viral epidemic that turned England into a zombie factory; rather, new director and co-writer Juan Carlos Fresnadillo is subtly but unmistakably more interested in the carnage. Sure, we have protagonists to root for, this time a small family and some conscientious military personnel. But who really cares about them when there's nonstop bloodletting to get to?

As the title tells you, 28 Weeks Later takes place about six months after the original ended. The infected – who instantly turn into ravenous, blood-puking maniacs after being exposed to the “Rage” virus – are believed to have all starved to death, and a U.S.-led NATO force has been brought in to begin reconstruction. Slowly, carefully screened people are brought back into London and set up in a small section of the city that's been declared safe. It's here that handyman Don (Robert Carlyle) reunites with his children, 12-year-old Andy (newcomer Mackintosh Muggleton) and his older sister, Tammy (the striking Imogen Poots), who were in a Spanish refugee camp during the outbreak. As for their mother (Catherine McCormack), well, Don sort of left her for dead when the house the couple holed up in was attacked.

Don tries to explain to them what the situation was like, but kids being kids, they run off outside the safe zone to visit their home and grab pictures of Mum. Imagine their surprise when they discover their Kodak moments haven't necessarily come to an end – their mother's there, hiding, shocked but still alive. (Um, what happened again, Dad?) It's not long, however, before the virus sneaks back into the quarantine, the soldiers declare Code “Shoot Everything That Moves” Red, and the siblings are suddenly so precious that people could just gobble them up.

As anyone who's seen the original knows, this franchise, like the Hostels and Hills Have Eyes of the New Horror trend, is not about camp. One-liners and those goofy slow-moving members of the old-school undead are absent, replaced by talk of hopelessness and monsters that seem to need a good exorcism more than a fresh supply of brains. There's even a lame attempt at political commentary if you choose to look for it: “They're shooting everyone!” says a citizen about the military. “This makes no sense!”

Those who'd rather ignore allusions to Iraq will also probably let slide bits of stupidity – though few are as glaring as in your typical American horror flick – that allow the plot to proceed as it does. It's the best way to approach the movie. Fresnadillo isn't exactly the new king of fright, relying too heavily on a shaky camera that results in several confusingly chaotic sequences and whipping out the loud, cheap scare from the Hack's Bag of Tricks. But the director's gift for creating atmosphere is undeniable: Besides the gallons of gore, there are several aerial shots of London, freakily deserted and dark; terrific action (when you can actually focus) such as the firebombing of the city and a helicopter-tuned-Cuisenart; and, more remarkably, lots and lots of quiet. People are wordless, the excellent score (by John Murphy) is used sparingly – in contrast to the mania, the effect is unsettling. You'll jump, squirm, and grip your armrest, but mostly 28 Weeks Later will leave you with a lingering sense of unease.

 

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com

Provoked

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There's no makeup in prison?

You're supposed to be horrified at the goings-on in Provoked: A True Story. As the subtitle trumpets, the drama is based on the experiences of a Punjabi woman named Kiranjit Ahluwalia, who was wed to a British Indian through an arranged marriage and spent the next 10 years being physically and mentally abused by him. Until, that is, the night in 1989 when she waited for him to fall asleep, doused his legs with gasoline, and set him on fire. Ahluwalia was immediately arrested on attempted murder charges; when  her husband died from his injuries, she got handed a life sentence. The case is most notable, though, because it became a landmark in British criminal law, the first time (in Ahluwalia's 1992 appeal) that “battered woman syndrome” became an acceptable defense for murder.

Unfortunately, director Jag Mundhra takes these truths and  fashions them into sub-Lifetime material. Written by Rahila Gupta (the woman who helped Ahluwalia pen her memoir) and Carl Austin, Provoked irritates more often than it elicits sympathy with its simplistic portrayal of the ordeal. Aishwarya Rai, famously declared the world's most beautiful woman, proves that she's far from the world's most talented actress in her turn as Ahluwalia. It's understandable that the character would be traumatized after the incident and, considering she spoke little English, shy about communicating. But Rai's widdle-girl voice when Ahluwalia does peep -- “He sleep with other womans!” -- is perpetually grating. And combined with her go-to expression – blank stare, occasionally tweaked with frightened-animal anime eyes – Rai grows nearly intolerable to watch, dialing up Ahluwalia's passivity to caricature levels better suited for, well, maybe a production by Waiting for Guffman's Corky St. Clair.

Provoked begins on the night of the crime. After an off-camera person torches Deepak (Lost's Naveen Andrews), we see Ahluwalia sitting outside her home with her two children, unresponsive to the authorities on the scene. She remains largely mute throughout questioning and even after being sent to jail, where guards mispronounce her name and a fellow inmate calls her “Asian Barbie.” (This astute geographical assessment by a boorish bully is one of the more egregious missteps in the often ridiculous script.) But Ahluwalia begins to open up thanks to her cell mate, Ronnie (Miranda Richardson), the Henry Higgins of the prison world who not only teaches delicate Ahluwalia to stand up to ruffians, but also encourages her to get a new look and dramatically improves her English as well. (“I need 'U'?” Ahluwalia asks Ronnie when she misspells “shoulder” during a Scrabble game. “Yes, you need me!” Ronnie responds, in case you weren't hip to her magic.)

Mundhra, who's mainly known for directing erotic thrillers, is terrifically awkward with the material, persistently cueing flashbacks by using things as generic as a meal to set off Ahluwalia's memories. Besides Deepak's brief hospital stay – in which he mutters to a nurse, “Bitch tried to kill me” -- these scenes are our only exposure to the character, and they're not exactly well-rounded. Deepak threatens, yells, throws his wife down stairs, etc., all without any indication of what drives him to such violence. Andrews, therefore, can't help but come off as paper-thin villain. Also ineffective is Nandita Das as the head of an advocacy group that helps Ahluwalia, acting shrill instead of passionate and throwing  school-play tantrums when something doesn't go their way. Provoked does get better in its last chapters, helped by Robbie Coltrane as a member of the Queen's Counsel who guides Ahluwalia and her supporters in their attempt to appeal. But neither the film's decent coda nor tragic subject matter can overcome its amateurish telling.

copyright 2007 themoviebabe.com