Judging from its poor box office
results on opening weekend, audiences didn't go crazy over this
movie. I, however, enjoyed it a lot. You don't see
too many mysteries anymore. When you do, usually they're
TV movies--and I have a natural urge to steer away from TV
movies, unless they're made for cable. This can be
considered a mystery/thriller, and you might even add romance to
the list, but mainly it's a mystery. And a very good one
indeed!
"The Truth About Charlie" is based on the 1960's
classic "Charade," which starred Cary Grant and Audrey
Hepburn. I actually own a copy of "Charade," but
haven't watched it in a while. I didn't find out this was
a remake of that movie until hearing about it on Leonard
Maltin's show "Hot Ticket." So if you ask me if
the original is better than the remake, I unfortunately cannot
give you the answer. All I have to tell you is I enjoyed
this movie very much. Besides, unlike many people, I don't
have a severe vendetta against remakes. I mean, what the
hell? They remake plays all the time, and no one complains
about that. When a group of college students perform a
rendition of "Romeo and Juliet," you don't hear audience
members whispering, "It was so much better when they
first showed it in the Globe Theater." There's
nothing wrong with different actors and different directors
giving their own spin. "Red
Dragon" is a great example.
As you
can easily guess, Thandie Newton takes on Audrey Hepburn's role
and Mark Wahlberg the Cary Grant role. In the film,
Newton's character returns from a vacation in the Caribbean to
find her apartment in Paris ransacked and her husband Charlie
gone. She is later told by the French police that her
husband was murdered, his body found alongside the train tracks.
As she wonders who could've killed him, she discovers her
husband's many false identities.
It is
then revealed, by an American police detective (Tim
Robbins), that her husband was keeping a ton of money.
No one knows where that money is. All he knows is there
are three acquaintances of Charlie who would love
to get their greasy little hands on that money.
She then falls
in love with a dashing American (Mark Wahlberg), who she meets
by fate and tries to help her out of this mess. Or does
he? Maybe it wasn't fate. Maybe he has something to
do with her husband's death.
The plot
contains many twists and turns, so I cannot reveal anything
beyond that point. I was wrapped up in the plot from start
to finish. If this were a book, I would classify it as a
page-turner--I'm not sure what the classification would be in
terms of film. The performances are great. Newton is
an exotic beauty, and though she may not have been the "absolute"
best to replace Hepburn, she's certainly effective. I'm
not a huge Mark Wahlberg fan, but one role he is great at
is playing the nice, soft-spoken guy with a hidden dark
side--like he did in the thriller "Fear." Once
again, he may not have been the best choice, but certainly an
effective one. And Tim Robbins is wonderfully creepy.
The
shaky camerawork is jarring at first, but as I became more and
more engaged in the plot, it became a blur to me. There
are some fine moments of humor, including a credit cookie which
you should definitely, definitely stay for. The settings
are beautiful. There is some brief nudity and mild sexual
content, which wasn't included in the original, but altogether
you should find this movie clean and tasteful, not just
considering today's standards but considering any standards.
Now I'm definitely gonna pop in "Charade" once I get
home!
