Based solely on a plot summary, Tarsem Singh's "The Cell" sounds like yet another entry into the overstuffed serial killer film genre. In the film, FBI agent Peter Novak (Vince Vaughn from "Swingers") tracks a sadistic serial killer who kidnaps women and then drowns them. With little time available to locate the next to-be-victim, Peter attempts to create a window into the serial killer's mind by using a futuristic device designed for coma-therapy. Using the machine, child therapist Catherine Deane (Jennifer Lopez) literally enters the thoughts of the serial killer to determine his motives and the location of the kidnapped woman.
But "The Cell" is almost as far from formulaic serial killer movies like "Seven," "The Bone Collector" and "Jennifer 8," as it could possibly be while still maintaining its serial killer-based plot. In the movie, the serial killer aspect serves more as a side-plot to make the film more palatable to viewers than anything else.
When going to a nighttime movie, you often find yourself among two different audience types, depending on the cultural norms in the population surrounding the movie theater. A rowdy, outspoken crowd that cheers when they approve of certain plot twists surfaces more often in urban centers (New York, L.A.), areas with a young population (college campuses) and lower-income neighborhoods. Contrarily, quiet, reserved crowds that react little throughout the film often appear in suburbs and upper-income areas.
A movie is doing something right when it makes one of these two stereotypical crowds break character.
At the showing of "The Cell" I attended in a predominantly white, high-income shopping center, in the beginning the audience acted as expected. But, during some of "The Cell's" more shocking and gripping sequences, it became obvious that the film induced an atypical audience reaction. Generally, everyone did keep quiet. But every so often, a few viewers would blurt out -- almost involuntarily -- exclamations such as, "Oh my God," "Wow. Wow" and "Jesus Christ." During some scenes in which you would expect murmuring among audience members, the moviegoers were instead deafeningly silent. The audience that accompanied me to "The Cell" had definitely not prepared themselves for the images that Singh's film brought to their screen.
Like all good movies, this is not a film for everyone. Singh previously directed music videos, and not surprisingly, his first full-length movie directorial debut is distinctly and predominantly visual. But these visuals are markedly unlike the special effects laden movies in which the summer season often drowns like this year's "What Lies Beneath" and "Hollow Man." Not only is "The Cell" exceptionally and beautifully filmed, but also the impact of many images causes them to be etched into viewers' brains long after the film's end. Some of the most powerful sequences -- one involving the death of a beautiful horse, another with a deep-violet emperor's robe and another showing bloody human intestines -- will become the hallmarks of this film for years to come. Singh's work here with cinematographer Paul Laufer deserves a mountain of praise and probably an Oscar nomination.
Thankfully, the visuals serve as more than simple eye candy. Singh designed the visuals to reflect the maze of the serial killer's twisted mind, and each shot conveys an emotional and powerful visceral feeling of the state of the killer's thoughts. Even beyond this, "The Cell" is a truly frightening and disturbing movie, one that puts horror movies like "What Lies Beneath" and thrillers like "The Beach" to shame. Most of them time, this fear stems not from stock tactics, but from innovative and foreign images that make viewers want to look away. The visuals don't stand-in for the story, and they don't simply compliment the story. They tell the story.
Vaughn and Lopez do a fine job, but their acting takes a backseat to the film's overall look and feel. To their credit, they never seem out of place and they manage to avoid sticking out like sore thumbs -- which could easily happen in such a visually well-calculated film. To the script's credit, one scene involving the two manages to subtly hint at a complex back-story without beating viewers over the head with a drawn-out expository sequence.
"The Cell" only trips up when it forces itself to leave the interior dream world of the serial killer's mind and returns to the real-world story of finding the dying kidnap victim. The movie's ending has little room for surprise, and a few silly lines expository lines ("What's the third chair for?") take us out of the movie's beautiful and frightening world -- but only for a moment. Because the script treats these sections as sidebars to the movie's primary focus (the journey inside the mind), these small missteps are easily forgiven. "The Cell" is unconventional and unlike all of this summer's offerings. Although it may be hard to palate for some, movie lovers who know what they are getting themselves into can simply sit back and say, "Wow."
