Rating: 
Summary: Thumbs-Down Thriller
Review: I don't watch many horror movies but I do know which aspects make them palpably frightening. A prime example is "The Sixth Sense", a film which focused upon the interest, fear and even skepticism that we the American populace generally have of the supernatural, particularly ghosts. Enthralling throughout, "The Sixth Sense" didn't rely upon a violin-laden, fright-inducing score to make the audience's skin crawl; it was largely dependent upon and owes its ominous success to a credible story/screenplay, strategic lighting, make-up and most importantly, the performances of the actors. "Gothika", through its many recent TV spots, purports itself to be a supernatural thriller in the league of "The Sixth Sense" but fails to make the cut, its efforts to induce terror painfully obvious and its plot eventually falling into a pattern of predictability (but two tweens who sat in my row at the theater would beg to differ, promptly SCREAMING at every cue of suspenseful music). The story carves its flimsy foundation with Dr. Miranda Grey (Berry) making her rounds at an asylum of which her husband Doug (Dutton) is the chief administrator. Driving through a heavy downpour after a late night at the office, a giant sinkhole surrounded by a police barricade forces Miranda to take an alternate route home and she nearly mows down a young girl standing in the middle of the road. When she leaps out of her SUV in a panic to check on the girl, the drenched and whimpering lass promptly bursts into flames with a heinous shriek and Miranda blacks out. When Miranda regains consciousness she finds herself back in the asylum, only this time she's a patient locked in a cell in the solitary ward. Visited by fellow psychiatrist and former co-worker Pete Graham (Downey), she learns that Doug has been brutally murdered and that she is the culprit, having repressed the memory of the crime for three years. On top of the shock of losing her husband, Miranda is haunted by the disgruntled spirit of Rachel Parsons (Mackey), the very specter who appeared on the road that fateful night. Distraught over Pete no longer taking her seriously ("You can't trust somebody when they think you're crazy") and Rachel's violent visitations, Miranda comes closer to discovering a horrible truth and even her expertise in neuropsychiatry won't prepare her for what she finds out. Berry, now an Oscar alum, disappoints not because of her performance but because of her invested time in a high-expectations/low-payoff film (the same can be said for Robert Downey Jr., now making a comeback after a long struggle with drug addiction). A-list thespian Bernard Hill (Titanic, Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers) wastes his time as well and Penelope Cruz is a bore as disheveled mental patient Chloe. Matthieu Kassovitz, having played the field as a screenwriter and an actor, has now done what most accomplished people in the entertainment industry (particularly actors) set their sights on - directing. Although he has manned a few productions already (almost all of them in French), "Gothika" marks his place in America as a director and he brings with him a screenplay from Sebastian Gutierrez, a man who like himself has a couple of slashes in his job title (actor/director/screewriter). Bottom line, "Gothika" may scare a younger crowd that's not keen on horror movies but for more mature audiences, it will dash hopes on many levels. If you haven't already, grab "The Sixth Sense" at your local video store or pick up "The Exorcist", "Alien" and/or Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho" (all three titles are on imdb.com's "Top 50 Horror Films" list) and kill the lights - you're in for a frighteningly good time.
Rating: 
Summary: "I See Dead People" 2
Review: I'm not an aficionado of scary, slasher flicks. But Halle Berry is too much of a Babe to pass up in GOTHIKA. Besides, my Mom, a former prison psychiatrist, wanted to see it. Berry plays Dr. Miranda Grey, a shrink on the staff of a women's penitentiary that has all the ambience of a Transylvanian castle. Driving home on a dark and stormy night - hey, is there any other kind in this genre? - Miranda swerves into a ditch to miss a young woman standing in the road. Upon asking the near-victim if she's OK, Miranda observes that she's been physically abused. Then, the woman undergoes spontaneous combustion. Miranda next wakes up to find herself an inmate on her own psycho ward, under arrest for chopping her husband (Charles Dutton) up into little pieces, and in the care of a former colleague (Robert Downey, Jr.). Berry's performance makes the film great fun to watch despite a preposterous storyline that, at the end, had me saying "Yeah, but ..." about too much of what I'd seen. And the set designers weren't at all subtle in their use of flickering lights, shadows, and general gloominess. I had to check to see if I'd inadvertently left my sunglasses on for the show. Perhaps the prison was economizing on the use of electricity after being forced into the California Plan. Really scary stuff is sometimes more effective in full daylight because it's less expected. Penelope Cruz, another hottie in my book, appears as Chloe Sava, an inmate accused of cutting her stepfather's throat, and who claims to being repeatedly raped by the devil in her prison cell. While this is a clue to the endgame, it added nothing to the plot's credibility. In retrospect, it was just another "Huh?" that defies understanding if you think about it too much. Downey's performance was unremarkable, and his Dr. Graham character serves only as straight man to Miranda's more frenetic moments. GOTHIKA is a chilling ride on which Halle Berry is pretty much the only driver. Keep the DVD release in mind next Halloween as something to watch while waiting for those pesky trick-or-treaters.
Rating: 
Summary: Gothika--pretty good until the train wreck
Review: Gothika was a decent movie until the end--an absolute train wreck. What happened?? What were they thinking? Otherwise, the movie had chills and thrills and kept me on the edge of my seat. I don't know if Castle would have been proud, but overall, it wasn't too shabby. It was much better than last springs disappointing "Identity." The only REALLY annoying thing in the movie (other than the ending) was Halle Berry's screaming. She really got on my nerves with that constant shrilling scream. And another thing, why put a bunch of scary music around everything that occurs in a movie? This seems to be a new annoying Hollywood habit. If someone is just going to the bathroom, we don't need the DA NUH DA NUH DA NUH--for goodness sakes, don't be sooo cheap! Go see Gothika. It's worth the price of admission.
Rating:
Summary: Abre Los Ojos and Ringu combined.Good thriller despite flaws
Review: With a title like Gothika, the brief descriptive blurb, and the haunting dark-blue tinted image of Halle Berry on the rear of the weekly TV schedule, I figured it merited a look. Miriam Gray is on her way home after a session with Chloe at the Woodward Penitentiary, a correctional facility for women. Seems that Chloe is re-embellishing the images of being assaulted by her stepfather, by saying it is the devil who is doing this to her, and it burns. Miriam is naturally skeptical, as Chloe is dragged away kicking and screaming. Doug, head of the facility and Miriam's husband, explains it by use of of water splashed on a mirror. The distorted image is how Chloe sees herself, but the psychiatrist is able to see the actual person, giving him/her the adventure. That's what the viewer must decide in the omniscient view. What is real and what is not? Innocuous beginning, right? Cut three days later. Miriam finds herself wearing a blue uniform, lying on a cot in a cell, with a glass door separating her from the hallway. Horror of horrors, she realizes she is now an inmate of Woodward, and it befalls upon Peter Graham, a colleague who had an extramarital crush on her, to inform her that Doug has been murdered....by her! Naturally, she is distraught, as she has no memory of the crime... but Peter thinks she is crazy, as the evidence points out she is guilty. Chloe's words return to haunt her. "You can't trust anyone who thinks you're crazy." Not even Dr. Parsons, another colleague, can help her. She remembers going home to Doug, yet the last image we see of her was her discovering a strange blonde girl standing drenched in the rain, slash marks across her chest. Could this have anything to do with her? Miriam discovers what it's like to be an inmate. She is now nobody, and the viewer is given a shot of her from behind, the zip on her ill-fitting blue uniform unzipped. The shower scene with all the woman isn't gratuitous as in those women in prison flicks of the 70's. However, none of those movies ended up with the main character slashing her own arm from a hallucinatory illusion. This mixes the amnesia and flurry of images of Abre Los Ojos with the supernatural element of Ringu. The jarring hallucinatory images come at a frenzy. Some of them are bloody and violent, the rest involve the appearance of the blonde girl. The movie is coded in the time old classic way--horrible things happen only in the darkly lit scenes. Things begin to get weird when she is attacked by the girl, yet the guards watching the camera think she's trying to do herself in. Hallucination or supernatural? And what do the words "Not Alone" which she sees on the walls and even carved into her arm(!) mean? And some of the red herrings, the dramatic music that swells up, only to reveal... nothing, do get excessive, so it's as if a gallon of sweat dripped off the movie watcher for nothing. The obligatory chase and escape sequences are somewhat predictable. The story and premise are intriguing despite the flaws. Halle Berry does a laudable performance as Miriam, someone whose professional and personal life is put through the wringer and has to cope to get to the bottom of things and to determine if she really is sane. But if anyone delivers a performance in this movie it is Penelope Cruz, who alas appears in only a few scenes, but what scenes! After seeing her in Belle Epoque, Woman On Top, Captain Corelli's Mandolin, and Abre Los Ojos, her role as Chloe is a real change from romantic comedies or thrillers where she plays the romantic lead. Her skin is a pasty white here, and in the beginning of the movie, her cropped hair, manic eyes, and broken words, are a real contrast from Pelagia in Corelli. Then again, I wonder if she's finding this repetitive, having appeared in the similar Abre Los Ojos and Vanilla Sky. The worst character here is Robert Downey Jr. as Peter. He is barely audible in parts and delivers a wooden and not too likeable performance. Still, a potent and gripping psychological thriller.
Rating: 
Summary: Great movie-scary as hell!
Review: You know-this is all of my 2 cents-because for most of the movie I was cowering in my seat and covering my eyes. I am very prone to nightmares-so if you're like me-watch this movie with someone.
Halle Berry plays Dr. Miranda Grey a psychologist (psychiatrist?) for a women's mental institution in Connecticut. She begins the movie counselling a patient named Chloe- (Penelope Cruz)-who has been suffering from rape trauma. You are drawn in and introduced to her cushy, perfect life as a doctor who objectively treats her patients, and has a certain aloof detachment from them. The visuals exhibit this with the change of scenery from the dungeon-like ward where the women are kept, and Dr. Grey's upstairs academic office. You find out she has everything she would want, respect and admiration from her fellow doctors, and a successful loving husband who is also a fellow doctor. She is motivated, driven and completely stolid and objective to her surroundings. The movie changes when she awakens after trying to treat a beaten girl whom she nearly ran over on the side of the road. The next thing is-she is in the actual ward where she is a patient who has been in a catatonic state for 3 days after she allegedly murdered her husband. The rest of the movie is basically about answering the one question-why??? Like I said-this movie is scary as hell-and has a lot of jumpy thrills and pop-outs, so if you're like me-make sure you have someone there with you and the lights on!!!! Other than that-it was awesome! Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: What are you looking for?
Review: It's a VERY rare occurrence that I'll be totally drawn into a movie, but Gothika did it. It did, however, manage to thoroughly traumatise me. I've watched slasher films and laughed, and watched psychological horror with grinning anticipation, and while I am glad to have watched this (it was very cathartic and EXTREMELY well made) I don't think I'll be watching it again.
Rating:
Summary: This year's best thriller
Review: It's got a little somrthing for everyone; suspence, gore, psycological horror, along with a great story that will keep you on the edge of your seat. I dug it.
Rating:
Summary: Gothika
Review: Well, there is a lot to be said about this movie, and having seen it last night, it is still fresh in my mind. Halle Berry plays brilliant psychologist Dr. Miranda Grey( and quite well too) and works in a mental institution. Dr. Grey spends time talking with Penelope Cruz's character( sorry, but I cannot remember her name) who tells her that she has been raped( and don't worry, this doesn't give away any important segments in the film). "It's hard to trust someone when they think you are crazy." One night, Dr. Grey gets into an accident while driving through a bridge in the pouring down rain( and I won't tell you what happens there). When she awakes, she is suddenly a patient in the very hospital where she works!!! This movie is slightly reminiscent of Stir of Echoes and FearDotCom. I could go on and on about this movie, but it's better than you see it for yourself. Remember, negative statements about a movie should not be taken seriously. Just because so and so was disappointed, doesn't mean that the rest of us have to be. Anyways, good luck and enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: One of the best of 2003
Review: This film was all that I expected and more. It is an Intense thriller- drama-horror film. It will leave you wondering the whole time what will happen next.It has a very twisted ending, and wild story line. This is definatly on my list of must see movies. In fact, I think that I would say that this may be one of the scariest of 2003. GO SEE IT.
Rating:
Summary: Gothika
Review: I saw this movie the Friday that it opened. I had a little knowledge about the movie and decided to go see it with my wife. She said it was a psychological thriller which is what she likes. I wasn't sure what to expect. It is a thriller and the music in parts can get you geared up for the unexpected scream for something seemingly suspenseful but leaving you just relaxing because nothing happened. THere are a few parts where there are graphic scenes of blood as well as sudden images. It was during those times that the girls in the theatre screamed in unison and you could only laughed. My wife practically jumped in my lap. I was able to figure out the story as it unfolded.Overall, I wouldn't go see it again. Halle Berry didn't pick a good movie to perform in. Neither of the actors did unless they are looking for work. No awards here. If you just like to figure out who done it in mysteries you would like that part of it. If you want to hang on your seats and then there are suspenseful parts that happen very quickly, enough to make girls scream loudly anyway. 2 out of 5 stars
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