Truth is, don’t see ‘Charlie’; Wait for ‘The Ring’ on video

You can’t handle ‘The Truth about Charlie’

“The Truth About Charlie” is that Charlie is a complete mystery to

his wife. In truth, Regina, having just returned from the Caribbean,

is going to ask her husband for a divorce, even though they’ve only

been married for three months. But now she doesn’t need to, because

he’s dead. And Regina wonders why in the world the French police

think she did it.

Thandie Newton plays the sometime naive, often stupid Regina

Lambert. The role really only calls for Newton to prance about and be

saved, and she works the part well. Mark Wahlberg plays Joshua

Peters, a man Regina meets in the Caribbean and continues to run into

after she has returned home to Paris. Wahlberg is capable as a man of

mystery but isn’t given a chance to do much more than make scary

faces and wheedle his way into Regina’s life. Although the supporting

cast includes Tim Robbins and Lisa Gay Hamilton, they never get much

chance to do anything of real importance.

Warning: This filmic ride may make you sick! Jonathan Demme uses

circular camera angles and the pictures rarely stops bouncing up and

down. The picture often stops and then speeds forward a minute later.

It’s disorienting. The worst part is that these photography tricks

don’t help the telling of the film, they only hinder it and draw

puzzled looks from moviegoers.

The story is dull and lifeless. It’s hard to care about any of the

characters and the question “Why are we watching this?” keeps popping

up. The conclusion of the mystery is a shot in the dark and the

ending of the movie is predictable. Bizarre characters and events

burst into the movie and the credits. And classical pianist Charles

Aznavour is for some strange reason displayed and allowed to give a

short performance at the end.

“The Truth About Charlie” is not worth knowing.

“The Truth About Charlie” is rated PG-13 for some violence, sexual

content and nudity.

* MELISSA RICHARDSON is a Costa Mesa resident and a junior at UC

Irvine.

Getting ‘The Ring’ less creepy than expected

A remake of “Ringu,” one of Japan’s hits of 1998, “The Ring” was

directed by Gore Verbinski (“Mouse Hunt”) and produced by Walter

Parkes and Laurie MacDonald (“Gladiator,” “Men in Black 2”). The

suspense thriller stars award-winning actress Naomi Watts

(“Mulholland Drive”), Martin Henderson (“Windtalkers”), newcomer

David Dorfman and Emmy winner Brian Cox (“Rob Roy,” “Manhunter”).

Under unexplained circumstances, investigative newspaper reporter

Rachel Keller’s teenage niece Katie has just passed away. A friend

who was with her when she died is in the psychiatric ward of a mental

hospital. Whatever happened to them, they were scared. It seems Katie

was scared to death.

At the funeral, it sounded like just another urban legend being

discussed by Katie’s friends -- a story of a videotape filled with

nightmarish images. After watching it, the viewer gets a phone call

and then dies in exactly seven days.

Skeptical at first, Rachel (Naomi Watts) investigates and finds

that three other teenagers who supposedly watched the tape with her

niece all met with mysterious deaths too; all at exactly the same

time.

Rachel tracks down the video and she watches it, mesmerized by the

disturbing images and sounds. Feeling very uneasy, immediately

afterward she receives a phone call. The voice of a young girl eerily

says, “You have seven days.”

Rattled and convinced something is definitely wrong, she asks her

video expert friend Noah (Martin Henderson) to help track down the

tape’s origin and get to the bottom of its unsettling imagery. Her

skepticism quickly turns to fear however, particularly after her

young son (David Dorfman) mistakenly views the tape as well. She now

knows she has just seven days to unravel the mystery of the tape.

While not among the scariest movies I’ve ever seen, “The Ring” is

definitely a creepy film with good casting, a surprisingly

interesting story and great visuals. Set in the Pacific Northwest, it

provided a perpetually overcast, rainy, cold and gloomy atmosphere

that added to the story’s overall feeling of suspense and dread.

On my personal rating scale of “Pay Full Price,” “Bargain

Matinee,” “Video Rental” or “I’d Rather Watch A REALLY Scary Video

(like a tape of a past ‘Regis & Kathy Lee Show),” I give “The Ring”,

rated PG-13 for violence, sexual content and language, a rating of

somewhere between “Video Rental” and “Bargain Matinee.”

* RICHARD BRUNETTE is a recreation supervisor for the city of

Costa Mesa and a Costa Mesa resident.