Godsend Review
by Susan Granger (ssg722 AT aol DOT com)May 3rd, 2004
Susan Granger's review of "Godsend" (Lion's Gate Films)
While the concept of bringing back a loved one who has died propels this cautionary tale, another question occurs: what's happened to the script sense of actor Robert DeNiro?
As the story begins, Paul (Greg Kinnear) and Jessie (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) Duncan lose their only child, eight year-old Adam (Cameron Bright), in a tragic accident. Along comes a mysterious genetic scientist, Dr. Richard Wells (that's DeNiro), who makes the bereaved couple a Faustian offer they cannot refuse. If they will turn over their deceased son's body to him within 72 hours, sever all ties with friends and family and move to a lakefront mansion near his fertility clinic, the Godsend Institute, in rural Vermont, he will clone them a new Adam. And he does.
The new Adam is an adorable child until his eighth birthday. Then weird things begin to happen. "Did I die?" he queries his parents. Adam has creepy nightmares and exhibits disturbing behavior. Then he hallucinates about a boy named Zachary, a parochial school and a fire, all somehow connected to Dr. Wells, who obsessively rotates two steel balls clenched in his palm.
While the provocative premise seems to be about the ethics of human cloning, writer Mark Bomback and director Nick Hamm soon veer off into the sloppy, senseless clichés of low-budget horror movies. Lots of banal shocks, shtick and schlock. The actors manage to play their parts as authentically as possible, given the awful script, but one wonders if they even read this drivel before reporting to work. Supposedly, Hamm filmed five different endings. Whatever they were, he must have picked the worst. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, "Godsend" is a ghostly, ghoulish, ghastly 1. Given the credibility of its cast, it's the worst picture so far this year.
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