I've heard lots of stuff about this flick. Most of it was the equivalent of a dismissive wave ("Oh, this is just a 1990s version of The Hidden with a big name star attached to it."). Now, the voice in my head said, this may be true, but, comon, man, it's Denzel Washington!
True enough. Okay. So I was ready to hear this movie out. We haven't heard from Mr. Washington (you know, I only know of one white guy in history name "Washington" . . . hmmm . . .) since I reviewed Virtuosity way back in the day. If my mother new of this huge Washington Void on this site, she would die of a coronary before lung cancer has its chance to take her down.
Fallen is one of those movies with a stupid advertising campaign. I remember seeing the trailer on TV, and how said trailer went about revealing the movie's Big Secret (well, one of them). So, yes, Virginia, there is a killer who is jumping bodies in this movie. I went in knowing this. However, thanks to the other twists and turns the script provides (thanks be to screenwriter Nicholas Kazan, the person you all blame for Bicentennial Man), I still found Fallen a very enjoyable little suspense movie.
Weird ass serial killer Edgar Reese (Elias Koteas) is scheduled to be gassed. But not before one more conference with the man who put him there, detective John Hobbes (Washington). They hob knob for awhile, then Reese grabs Hobbes' arm and starts to talk in a 4000 year old dead language. Oooh-kay. It's defiantly time to introduce this guy to my friend, and yours, Mr. Nerve Gas.
(Okay, I admit it; I don't know what type of gas the (California?) penile system uses on its felons. But, hey, if you do, the e-mail address is up, thataway.)
As he is gassed into the next plane of existence, an Evil POV cam reveals the movie's true villain escaping the killer's body. It isn't long before more murders are popping up, each with Reese's old MO.
Of course, this totally baffles Hobbes and his partner Jonesy (John Goodman). After some digging, though, Hobbes discovers a connection to an old cop named Milano, who committed suicide long ago at a mysterious cabin in the woods. The digging upsets both his boss, Lt. Stanton (Donald Sutherland), and Milano's mysterious daughter, Gretta (Embeth Davidtz).
Things come to a head when the real body jumping Ultimate Evil reveals itself to Hobbes. In what is probably the best sequence in the movie, the Evil confronts Hobbes on a crowded street, torturing, taunting, and threatening him from at least a dozen bodies. And, when forced to kill a man possessed by the Evil, Hobbes must clear his name, and protect his family from a creature that can be anyone, or anything it wants to be.
That right there is the real creepy thing about movies like this in general and Fallen in particular. Thanks to some sweet direction by Gregory Hoblit, even scenes of everyday normalcy become very creepy. The thought that the dude standing next to me at the checkout counter could be Ultimate Evil gets about a 9.5 on my "Creepy-Shit-O'-Meter".
But you can't be creepy without good people to back you up. Lucky for them, they've got Denzel Washington on the set. And he's a long way from the grimacing "look at me, I'm the anti-hero!" roll from Virtuosity. Hobbes is a very understated character. Very subtle, very . . . well, normal. Which, I suppose, is the point.
John Goodman, though, really turns out a good one here. Know mostly for playing a piece of trailer trash, Goodman actually gets to flex a little with this roll. Jonesy is a very world-weary pragmatist, a guy who's pretty much thrown up his hands in disgust with the whole enterprise of life. He's a good counterpart for Washington who, while not being exactly a ray of sunshine, at least smiles once or twice.
A part of me is thankful that Embeth Davidtz's character doesn't become a love interest for Denzel. Too many women in these movies become Ladies in Waiting for Our Hero. Of course, she doesn't get to kick Ultimate Evil in the balls, either. So she isn't left with much to do in the plot, except provide mystery. Oh well, at least she's good at that.
So, with a creepy concept, likeably normal characters fleshed out by good actors, nice direction, and a few big names thrown in the mix, Fallen is a pretty sure bet. In this age of Scream (you know, the good one) rip-offs, what we have here is a horror movie that tries to scare you with atmosphere and story line, instead of a body county. Boy, you remember when that used to be the rule, instead of the exception?
Me, neither.
Gs (out of a possible five)
MOCK O' METER
Wanna buy? Here, time's on your side.