The Ninth Gate

Rating:
Summary: Love it or hate it, a clever adaption of The Club Dumas
Review: ... This movie is too dark for many people, I would guess, and probably spends too much time setting the stage for others. However, dark though it be, this movie is tremendously witty, and there is a quirky humor to the movie, aided by Johnny Depp's nailing the lead role down perfectly. If you love this movie as I do, you MUST read the book its based on, The Club Dumas, by Arturo Perez-Reverte. The Ninth Gate is a clever adaption of the book. While the book has three interwoven plot lines (only one of them being based on the occult), the movie is basicly an adaption of one of those lines, with elements of the other plot lines being included for color personality and character development. Endings differ as a result, but both endings are a good fit given the direction taken in each medium. While the movie is thus a dramatic departure from the book in some ways, it is true to its spirit and Depp does a great job of "getting" the character in the book and bringing it to the film. If the screenplay had followed the interweaving plot of the book loyally, the movie would have been much slower, and though I would still have loved it, I suspect it would have had even more trouble at the box office. I can't say which I like better, the book or the movie -- a complement to both.

Rating:
Summary: Sophisticated
Review: Makes you feel like you're a confidant of a cool guy on a wild, slightly dangerous adventure.

Rating:
Summary: This movie is not bad....
Review: It just is slow moving, but so what? Who cares? It stil manages to make your skin crawl. Funny when I saw this I NEVER gave it a second thought, but now I know I'll NEVER watch again, I'd have guilty concious knowing God doesn't want me to. But despite that, this movie aint bad. If you can stand a movie completely saturated in satanic ritual. I think alot of ppl write this movie off because they don't understand it or don't pay much attention to it. So its not a movie for anyone that's for sure, but what movie is? And I may not entirely understand this movie and its fine with me, but if you want to watch it cool, just don't let ANYONE keep you from watching it, unless its God.

God Bless ~Amy

Rating:
Summary: Just on the other side of being (overall) a good film
Review: Polanski's direction and the performances from Johnny Depp and Ms. Steigner are noteworthy. But as i've said before it all starts and ends with the story. And this one is indeed quite interesting but it never reaches any type of acceptable conclusion or reconciliation. That's not to say that a film has to reach such an end to be considered good but this one in particular needed some sort of finality to it. And that finality never comes. However... the ride is very enjoyable but the ending (or shall I say, lack thereof) left me wanting.

Throughout the film I felt almost like I was watching an old Hitchcock film. The images and backdrops lend themselves to the creation of a rather dark and ominous mood. It was palpable and quite well done I might add. But to me the Amazon.com reviewer hit it right on the head... the film never really went anywhere. Now I can compare this to another Johnny Depp vehicle "The Astronaut's Wife" which, without reaching any real sense of finality, was to me much more satisfying overall than the Ninth Gate.

So if you can enjoy the ride without needing an acceptable climax then this one may be right for you.

Rating:
Summary: Best Occult Film Ever
Review: This movie is the best occult filmever made, bar none, and Polanski's best film. It is evenbetter than the book. It never found its niche when first screened because it is not a horror film, but an intellectualfilm. It takes a half dozen veiwings to catch all the symbolism. And yes Virginia, there are peoplein this world that do rituals fromthese types of books. And Polansky knows ..........

Rating:
Summary: Amazing
Review: It is amazing how many viewers totally miss the point of the Polanski film. They should pay close attention to the director's commentary. For the clearest and most detailed analysis in print, look up the entry for this film in Charles Mitchell's THE DEVIL ON SCREEN, a superb film book from McFarland. Meanwhile, both this flm and DVD deserve the highest rating.

Rating:
Summary: Superior supernatural thriller won't please FX junkies
Review: The Ninth Gate is an intriguing thriller that will put some viewers off because it is a throwback to a time when special effects were not king. There are virtually no F/X here and what few there are ones the movies could easily do thirty years ago. Personally, I enjoy seeing a good story and good acting, so I wasn't much bothered by this. I know that much of today's audience is conditioned to expect lots of graphics and thunderous noises. Knowing beforehand that they are mainly absent here may help some people to enjoy this occult story more.

Dean Corso [Johnny Depp] deals in rare books. He's not an intellectual. He's a shrewd operator, and it's all about money. When we first meet him, he is dealing with the greedy children of an incapacitated old man. He does his appraisal, and along the way, he talks them into selling a first edition of Don Quixote for $4,100. He makes a killing on the deal. His next appointment is with Boris Balkan [Frank Langella], a billionaire collector of books. Balkan has purchased one of three existing copies of a book published in 1668. The author was accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake. Balkan alleges that only one of the three copies is authentic, and he offers Dean a fortune to go to Europe in order to examine the others. Dean has no spiritual beliefs. He believes in profit. He doesn't think much about the deal until he notices he is being followed. Next his apartment is ransacked. He gives the book to a friend for safe keeping. This has dire consequences, but Dean decides to go on to Europe anyway. The other half of his pay depends on his going through with the deal. He goes first to Spain and then to Paris. Along the way, everything becomes spooky, and the death toll mounts. Dean starts to believe.

Depp, as usual, is great. Wearing eye glasses and sporting graying temples, he is totally believable in the part. Langella has only three scenes, but he makes the most of them. Barbara Jeffers is notable as a rich, hard-nosed book collector who sizes Dean up in about ten seconds.

Roman Polanski has lived in France for many years and has returned to his European roots as a film maker. The Ninth Gate has a much slower pace than did his Hollywood classics, Rosemary's Baby and Chinatown. Europeans tend to take their time in telling a story. They like to color things in. I enjoy this from time to time, but the pace will prove to slow for some viewers. I also should tell you that the 'payoff' at the movie's climax is pretty tame and ambiguous by American standards. We no longer comprehend the concept of understatement.

Rating:
Summary: If you've read the book...
Review: then this movie really doesn't come up to scratch. The book ('The Dumas club' by the Spanish author Perrez-Reverte) was an intricate detective story with a couple of killer twists; the movie is, basically, half the book. If you liked the imagery of the movie then I seriously reccomend you read the book (which is a bit of a cross between Raymond Chandler and Umberto Eco), however if you've read the book, do not see the movie. It can only let you down! One of the major problems (apart from the hacking apart of the story) is that Polanski builds up suspense only to ruin it all by showing too much. Scenes that would have worked really well in the background are played in main view and consequently, we're really given little doubt about what is going on. However, the atmosphere is nice and Depp is superb. Probably if you don't expect too much then this is a very nice film, but it's not up to the suspense of Rosemary's baby, as noted in the other reviews

Rating:
Summary: but no thanks necessary!
Review: Roman Polanski is a great director and the cast here is great (except for Mrs. Polanski, who could make wood look like Olivier), but I sat through this one and was disappointed.

I was all set for a great supernatural detective thriller, with Polanski at the helm no less - what I got instead was a slow build of suspense, building... building... to no payoff. The plot turns on Balkan's (Frank Langella) hiring of Corso (Johnny Depp) to find and buy for him two rare books - but Balkan's jumping on a plane and stealing them himself! Why did he hire Corso in the first place? So Depp could have several witty exchanges with Langella on the phone, each time asking him "Where are you?" without answer? Not enough to hang a plot on, guys.

...Even if the ending is supposed to leave you to your own interpretation, as many reviewers have suggested, it's still a huge letdown and wrecks the movie.

I'm still shaking my head at this one. Want a scary Polanski movie? Try "Rosemary's Baby".

Rating:
Summary: Great Film
Review: I loved this movie, and the DVD was great. My only criticism of the DVD is that when they include the engravings from the book they omit the true Ninth engraving (the most important one really). They include the Aristide Torchia version and the forgery (with the fire), but the Luciferian one with the light shining from inside the castle is not included.