Dark Water Review
by samseescinema (sammeriam AT comcast DOT net)July 10th, 2005
Dark Water
Reviewed by Sam Osborn of www.samseescinema.com
Rating: 2.5 out of 4
To be honest, I've grown tired of this Japanese horror genre that exploded with The Ring back in 2002. Every other two-minute trailer totes the credit of having been written from "the author of The Ring." But the last three or four films from this director or screenwriter or novelist that produced The Ring have all revolved around the very same plot-line. Without giving too much away, suffice it to say that if you've seen any of The Rings or The Grudge, you'll have a pretty good idea of how Dark Water's storyline will play out. When will the psychological horror imports from Japan start being imaginative? They're all sufficiently creepy, but only The Ring Two had some real scares. The scratching on the wall still haunts me, by the way.
If I didn't know any better, I'd swear Dark Water had been directed by David Fincher (Fight Club, Se7en). It's dripping in so much handsomely gritty atmosphere, that Dark Water might actually work better without the dialogue. Dark water in itself isn't a frightening image. But director Walter Salles (The Motorcycle Diaries) manages to make it into a monster. The spot on the ceiling grows, breathes, and seems to organically grow. But none of this personification is shown through anything but the visuals.
The film's set in Roosevelt Island, a Tram ride away from Manhattan, in an apartment complex that was originally built to be a utopia. To Salles, "utopia" is probably some sort of sick joke. The place looks like a Russian Gulag. The scene from Downfall, where papers are being destroyed at the hospital by being thrown from the windows, is most reminiscent of the set. But interestingly enough, Salles spares us the haunted house clichés. The apartment complex seems creepy, and yes, it is haunted, but we're not subjected to ham-handed creaky doors or jump-happy mirror tricks. Salles has the feel of a master storyteller. This much is apparent. Problem is, Dark Water's screenplay gives him little to tell.
It opens with a flashback to the 70's, where Dahlia (Jennifer Connelly) is left in the pouring rain after school by her mother. Her way to pass the time was to use an old drum toy. The one where you twist it between your hands and two strings flop around to hit a drum. The sound of the toy haunts her to present time, where we're then shown her cruel custody battle with ex-husband Kyle (Dougray Scott). Kyle wants Dahlia and their young daughter Cecilia (Ariel Gade) to move to Jersey City where he's moved. Dahlia suspects his motive for Jersey City is the girl on the side, and rebels by leasing a place on Roosevelt Island. The seller is the slimy used-car salesman-esque Mr. Murray (John C. Reilly). Murray introduces them to the doorman/security/plumber Veeck (Pete Postlethwaite), who seems to notice something in Dahlia and her daughter. Their first night in the new apartment, the two find a water spot on the bedroom ceiling. Informing Mr. Veeke of the problem, he shoes them over to Murray, who circles them back around to Veecke, avoiding the issue. And so the creepy water spot increases. But as it grows, Dahlia hears footsteps in the floor above, where the water's coming from. Telling Mr. Murray about it, he informs her that nobody's been on the floor for six months. Suspecting it's Kyle trying to make a case for Dahlia's mental instability, she hires a cheap and lonely lawyer, Jeff Platzer (Tim Roth). Meanwhile, Ceci has conjured up an imaginary friend at her new elementary school. All these elements make up the slow-moving mystery of Dark Water.
It's really dishonest to market Dark Water as a horror film. It's more on the level of The Machinist, where psychological thrills are more important than scares. The film rarely, if ever, tries to get a jump out of the audience. The screenplay takes us very far into its characters and its world and mystery, building and developing for most of the film, but never really hits full throttle. It tries to be slow and elegant, but fails in that it never picks up. Sitting in an opening night theatre packed tight with anticipating teenagers, I heard more than a few whispered complaints about how slow Dark Water was. Everybody expected The Ring. But what they got was a kind of re-hash of the same material, just done differently. It's almost a remake. Almost. But Salles gives his film something Gore Verbinski didn't: elegance. But as beautiful and eloquent as Dark Water looks and sounds, the story's got to pull its weight as well. And as American audiences are now learning, this Japanese psychological scare formula isn't working.
What does work however, are the performances. I have no complaints. In particular, Ariel Gade as Dahlia's daughter and Tim Roth as the lawyer put up admirable acts. Gade has the "it" that makes child actors so loveable. Dakota Fanning has it. Freddie Highmore form Finding Neverland has it. And Ariel Gade has it. It's raw acting talent. Jennifer Connelly does well in her lead role, doing the best she can with the material. She does her concerned, lonely, and stressed mother face exceptionally well. And John C. Reilly and Pete Postlethwaite as Murray and Veecke work well as counterbalance to each other. All in all, the acting is remarkable.
It was an interesting move for Walter Salles to move from foreign film to Hollywood after he struck gold with last year's The Motorcycle Diaries. The horror genre has hit its stride in popularity lately and a hit could propel any director's career. It's too bad Dark Water wasn't quite all there. Salles did the very best he could and his work will impress all who care to look for it. The real fault in Dark Water is in the story. It's fatally flawed.
-Sam Osborn of www.samseescinema.com
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