The Gift movie review & movie recap (2001)
Psychics and hair stylists have 3 points alike. They can appoint themselves, they can exercise of their homes and they do not have a great deal of overhead: a Tarot deck, hair shampoo, candle lights, scissors, incense, mousse. It helps if they have an encouraging manner, because many of their customers want to inform their difficulties and receive advice. Bad communities have a great deal of ladies functioning as beauty therapists or soothsayers. If you are a lady with couple of options, no hubby and a lot of kids, you can socialize the shingle and support on your own. The advice dispensed by these experts is often as great or better as the type that costs $200 a hr, because it originates from individuals that invested their developmental years living and learning. The problems of their customers are not academic to them.
Consider Annie Wilson (Cate Blanchett), the heroine of "The Present." Her hubby was eliminated in a mishap a year back. She has 3 kids. She obtains a federal government inspect, which she supplements by reading cards and recommending customers. She does not adopt mumbo-jumbo. She takes her present as a truth of life; her grandma had it therefore does she. She takes a look at the cards, she listens to her customers, she really feels their discomfort, she attempts to give common sense. She is practical, brave and great.
She resides in a overload of melodrama; that is truly the just way to explain her home town of Brixton, Ga., which is issued with one instance of every standard Southerly gothic kind. There is the damaged spouse and her redneck husband; the nation club sexpot; the good-looking institution principal; the weepy mama's boy that is afeared he might do something real bad; the cheatin' attorney; the salt-of-the-earth constable, and various weeping willows, pickup, rail fencings, nation clubs, shotguns, voodoo dolls, courtrooms, and so on. When you see a fish pond in a movie such as this, you know that eventually, it's mosting likely to be dredged.
With all these aspects, "The Present" could have been a poor movie, but it's a great one because it retrieves the category with the personalities. Blanchett's peace of mind and balance as Annie Wilson provide a solid facility, and the various other stars in a premium actors go for the realistic look in their personalities rather than being lured by the ridiculous. The movie was guided by Sam Raimi and written by Billy Bob Thornton and Tom Epperson. They know the area. Raimi guided Thornton in "A Simple Plan" (1998), that great movie about 3 friends that find a ton of money and attempt to conceal it; Thornton and Epperson composed "One Incorrect Move" (1992), about bad guys on the run and old secrets of love.
"The Present" starts by diving us right into the lives of the personalities, and after that turns into a thriller. Among Annie's kitchen-table customers is Valerie Barksdale (Oscar champion Hilary Swank), whose hubby, Donnie (Keanu Reeves), defeats her. Another is Friend Cole (Giovanni Ribisi), that is haunted by nightmares and is a seething basket situation full of bitterness versus his dad. Annie recommends Valerie to leave her hubby before he does more harm, and after that Donnie has 2 frightening scenes, one endangering her children, the various other a twelve o'clock at night visit where he uses the voodoo doll as a prop.
Social intermission: Annie goes to a nation club dancing where she has a flirty discussion with the institution primary (Greg Kinnear). He's involved to Jessica King (Katie Holmes), a sultry temptress (i.e. nation club slut) which Annie unintentionally sees having actually a quickie with another local guy. Not lengthy after, Jessica disappears, and Constable Pearl Johnson (J.K. Simmons), frustrated by an lack of hints, attract Annie for some of her "hocus-pocus." Annie has a desire that leads the legislation to Donnie Barksdale's fish pond, where the dead body is found, and Donnie appearances such as the obvious awesome. But Annie's visions do not quit, and we are left (1) with the opportunity that the murder may have been dedicated by several various other excellent prospects, and (2) with suspicion dropping on the psychic herself.
The movie is innovative in its plotting, colorful in its personalities, tight in its instructions and lucky in having Cate Blanchett. If this weren't a criminal offense picture (if it were sopped in social boost rather than thrills), it would certainly be easier to see the quality of her work. By completion, as all heck is breaking loosened, it is easy to forget how a lot everything depended upon the sympathy and gravity she provided in the first 2 acts. This role appears miles far from her Oscar-nominated "Elizabeth" (1998), but besides, isn't she once again an independent lady bordered by guys that want to belittle her power, seduce her, frame her or eliminate her? A lady that needs to depend on herself and her presents, and does, and suffices.