There are inherent problems with gimmicky movies, not the least being the gimmick has to pay off for the film to work.
Two hours of viewing time is all but flushed down the toilet if the final revelation either falls flat or the audience has already figured out the ending long before the final credits roll.
An equally nefarious drawback to these films is audiences no longer have the luxury of just sitting back and letting what's on the screen simply wash over them. The escapism of walking into a theatre is replaced by a competitive need to figure out the twist before the director intends. Or maybe that's just me. But I don't think so.
Call it The Sixth Sense syndrome.
With the late summer release in 1990 of a film about a boy who sees dead people, director M. Night Shyamalan put a new spin on the whodunnit genre and in doing so, unleashed a torrent of copycat productions, most of which have failed miserably, including some of his own.
While we loved the fact Shyamalan was able to pull the wool over our eyes, much of The Sixth Sense's success lay in the fact it took us by surprise.
Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice ...
Jump ahead to the release today of The Forgotten, a psychological thriller in which Telly Paretta (Julianne Moore) is told she only imagined the life of her eight-year-old son.
As far as Telly is concerned, her son was killed in a plane crash 14 months earlier, yet no one, not even her husband (Anthony Edwards), has any memory of him.
Just when her husband and psychiatrist (Gary Sinese) nearly have her convinced she might actually be cracking up, Telly turns to retired pro hockey player Ash Correll (Dominic West) whose daughter used to play with her son.
Ash, however, denies ever having a daughter, just a drinking problem that started about 14 months earlier. Coincidence? We think not. When Ash's memory is jolted, and the National Security Agency suddenly takes an interest in Telly, it appears there's more going on than we think. Or is there?
For anyone who has seen the trailers for The Forgotten, the movie's makers hint at something more than psychology at play here, maybe even something supernatural or demonic. Or do they just want us to think that way?
And thus the seed is planted.
For The Forgotten isn't really a gimmick movie at all, it's just one of those films you can't say too much about without giving it away.
In fact, The Sixth Sense syndrome might actually make The Forgotten better than it appears. Apart from Moore's convincing portrayal as a mother in distress, the rest of the cast are either given too little to work with or are too overwhelmed by their outrageous predicaments to sell their performances.
Chances are the twist you're trying to predict is better than what's actually delivered but it's fun nonetheless trying to stay one step ahead of director Joseph Ruben (Sleeping With the Enemy), who plays the game well, even throwing in a couple of legitimate scares along the way.
(This film is rated PG)
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