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 Director
: Lee Tamahori
Starring
: Morgan Freeman, Michael Wincott, Monica Potter, Dylan
Baker, Mika Boorem, Michael Moriarty.
Picture
2.35:1 Anamorphic, DD 5.1, Single Side, Dual-Layer, Keep
Case
Running
Time : 98 mins
See
this is you liked : Kiss the Girls, Seven, Silence of the
Lambs
The
story:
The
game is far from over.
An
influential Senators daughter is kidnapped from an exclusive
private school by one of the teachers names Gary Soneji
(Michael Wincott). The kidnapper soon makes a call to a
Alex Cross (Morgan Freeman), a police officer and illustrious
psychological profiler whose partner died eight months ago.
Cross is reluctantly involved in the case. One of the secret
service agents, Jezzie Flanagan (Monica Potter) who failed
to protect the girl at the school decides to help him in
order to make up for the mistakes that she made. But not
everything is what is seems, could this be just another
kidnapping or is there something more sinister at work.
The summary:
James
Patterson is one of the most prolific crime writers of the
last few years and his Alex Cross brand of novels are by
far his most successful. It was with trepidation that I
approached this film. Firstly because I am a big fan of
the novels and had been disappointed with Kiss the Girls
a few years previous. Secondly because Along came a spider
was actually the first of the novels and would have to be
told retrospectively.
Early
into the film it was obvious that the writers had opted
for the easy way out and left out all of the back story
surrounding Alex Cross. Gone were his family, his friends
and any reference to the previous film. Even his best friend
Sampson was absent, despite being in Kiss the Girls. Consequently
it leaves you with a hollow character. Someone who is purportedly
a genius at solving murders, but with no credibility to
the audience. Instead the filmmakers have taken the story
and cut off its edges until what you have is a neatly packaged
thriller that tries its best to maintain a semblance of
the original story.
Despite
Cross's lack of character development, Morgan Freeman is
very good in the lead role. For those of you that have read
the book he is clearly not suited to the part, but that's
just a niggle that will not spoil the film for non fans.
The action is sometimes sparse, but at times it does give
you something to think about. The real star of the film
for me is Michael Wincott, who despite being a little too
over zealous in the role actually comes across as being
very credible. Later on in the movie you discover that his
character is flawed, which adds weight to his earlier scenes.
Without giving the plot away you can expect a few twists
and turns, although the more dedicated among you should
work out the ending without too much thought.
Overall
this is a disappointing adaptation of one of the brightest
crime novels of the last decade. I have slightly increased
my score of the movie to highlight the fact that not everyone
who sees it will have read the book and therefore will not
be as disappointed as I was. At its best this is a genre
flick that tries to fit in somewhere between Silence of
the Lambs and Kiss the girls. It fails.
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