“The devil is in the details”
-- German Proverb
-- German Proverb
Depp as Corso The Ninth Gate wants to be creepy without being scary; it wants to be disturbing without being horrifying; it wants to be subtle without being boring. In most cases, it works, but the several glaring times it doesn't is what limits its score. Directed by Roman Polanski and starring Johnny Depp, it is that elusive movie where Depp works with a director not named Tim Burton, doesn't wear ridiculous makeup, or adopt distracting mannerisms. Because of that, it is also the rare movie where Depp can impress with his talent alone.
Langella as Balkan Depp plays Dean Corso: a slimy (I'm sure having Roman Polanski on set was great inspiration) rare books dealer who scratches out a living parting fools from their valuable books for a pittance before reselling them to whatever collector has contracted him. He plays a chain-smoking everyman who happens to get caught up in one collector's search for a book reputedly written by the Devil himself. It doesn't matter whether or not it was, or whether or not the Devil is even real. Corso soon learns that books can have power simply when enough people believe they do.
Where the movie comes through is the casting. Depp is the big name, but has to be, given the heavy lifting the script asks him to do. Everyone else is cast with the ideal of being a forgettable face. There are no impossibly devious masterminds, just a doughy Frank Langella's Boris Balkan after the book; no 10/10 seductress, just Lena Olin as an attractive, but a little weathered widow preying on Corso's depravity; no gorgeous love interest, just Emmanuelle Seigner as girl who knows more than she's letting on, and is pretty in a sort of harsh way. What all this average Joe casting does is pull you into the story even more. If there were an impossibly attractive, fit shadow society running around the film, it'd be tough to suspend disbelief. The fact that all of these people besides Depp look like someone you could run into at the mall serves the movie well. It's easier for it to build suspense when these feel like real people crossing paths with Corso.
Where the movie comes through is the casting. Depp is the big name, but has to be, given the heavy lifting the script asks him to do. Everyone else is cast with the ideal of being a forgettable face. There are no impossibly devious masterminds, just a doughy Frank Langella's Boris Balkan after the book; no 10/10 seductress, just Lena Olin as an attractive, but a little weathered widow preying on Corso's depravity; no gorgeous love interest, just Emmanuelle Seigner as girl who knows more than she's letting on, and is pretty in a sort of harsh way. What all this average Joe casting does is pull you into the story even more. If there were an impossibly attractive, fit shadow society running around the film, it'd be tough to suspend disbelief. The fact that all of these people besides Depp look like someone you could run into at the mall serves the movie well. It's easier for it to build suspense when these feel like real people crossing paths with Corso.
Olin as Telfer Where the movie fails are the scenes that get too campy. It's easy to stray too close to that line in a movie about the occult, but this one seems to revel in its forays into the corny. Albino bodyguards, black silk robes, and twin booksellers betray the movie's generally even keel approach. The soundtrack is too distracting to be ignored, and too repetitive to be competent. Still, viewed as a whole, this is an interesting direction to take an occult movie: rather than horror or action, it aims for thriller and is at least competent enough to warrant a viewing, given how rarely you can see a Polanski movie with a big name, or Johnny Depp playing a regular character. The potential was there for the movie to be much better, but Polanski's admitted lack of belief ultimately dooms it to mediocrity, with the director saying of the clichés present in The Ninth Gate, "You can make them appear serious on the surface, but you cannot help but laugh at them." In capable (or at least more open-minded) hands, it's interesting to think of what the movie might've been.
A movie that intrigues more than delivers, but is notable for Johnny Depp playing a rather flat character
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