This deliberate mystery about the death of a young man at an exclusive boy's school is surprisingly good. Edward Burns is a local police officer who suspects that foul play was involved. The body was found drowned in the local ice-laden river but his lungs contained traces of things found in toilet bowls. Was it a hazing accident? Well -- close but no cigar.
Burns' investigation must struggle through a thicket of opposition. His colleagues don't want to push the matter because the Haddon School is their benefactor. The school, with its frigid headmaster, isn't interested in probing too deeply because, well, after all -- foul play at Haddon? Burns himself is impelled mainly because he once helped his older brother commit suicide and perhaps, in solving the riddle of this case, he can partly redeem himself. Along the way, he spends a good deal of time with the dead boy's girl friend, a frizzy red head. And he meets and makes love to Jennifer Ehle, a blond photographer who is about to wed someone else. In the end, Burns, having found out the answer, decides that disclosure isn't necessary and certainly won't promote anyone's happiness, so he invents an explanation that absolves everyone of guilt.
The performances are all good, mostly from unfamiliar performers. Rachel Lefevre is the dead student's girl friend, not exactly gorgeous, plump-lipped and long-haired and sturdy looking, but she's quite attractive in an everyday way. Jennifer Ehle as the slightly whimsical photographer is Meryl Streepish and her romance with Burns isn't in the least convincing. Burns is rather good. He's a fine actor, and a fine actor without the brutish charm of a Johnny Depp or a Brad Pitt. His voice is high and it cracks often. Its most important feature is that it sounds believable. If Burns himself is particularly handsome, the fact was beyond my grasp, but I hope not. If he gets the applause he deserves, it would be cheapened a little if he were a heart throb. WILL KEN DITCH JENNIFER? I can see him in the tabloids now. But with any luck he'll be no more supermarket fodder than Anthony Hopkins or Ian McKellar.
If there's a problem with the film it's that it's a little TOO deliberate. And it swings from one sub-plot to another and back again and sideways, like a simple harmonic oscillator, just passing through the central story line from time to time. There are moments when it's entirely possible to forget what the movie is about.
Partly because any viewer is likely to be distracted by the gorgeous, wintry Nova Scotia settings. At time the snow is blue or yellow and seems to have leaped straight out of a post-impressionist painting. The small-town streets are choked with drifts and the village itself, which ought to be pretty dismal, looks more like a vacation snapshot. Rarely has a winter landscape had such luster.
One of the qualities that makes it so easy to recommend this is that it's made for adults -- or, more precisely, for people with an attention span that hasn't been cut off at the knees by MTV and commercials and glitzy news sound bites. You have to settle back to watch it, fold your hands behind your head, relax, and sort of slit your eyes slightly.
Burns' investigation must struggle through a thicket of opposition. His colleagues don't want to push the matter because the Haddon School is their benefactor. The school, with its frigid headmaster, isn't interested in probing too deeply because, well, after all -- foul play at Haddon? Burns himself is impelled mainly because he once helped his older brother commit suicide and perhaps, in solving the riddle of this case, he can partly redeem himself. Along the way, he spends a good deal of time with the dead boy's girl friend, a frizzy red head. And he meets and makes love to Jennifer Ehle, a blond photographer who is about to wed someone else. In the end, Burns, having found out the answer, decides that disclosure isn't necessary and certainly won't promote anyone's happiness, so he invents an explanation that absolves everyone of guilt.
The performances are all good, mostly from unfamiliar performers. Rachel Lefevre is the dead student's girl friend, not exactly gorgeous, plump-lipped and long-haired and sturdy looking, but she's quite attractive in an everyday way. Jennifer Ehle as the slightly whimsical photographer is Meryl Streepish and her romance with Burns isn't in the least convincing. Burns is rather good. He's a fine actor, and a fine actor without the brutish charm of a Johnny Depp or a Brad Pitt. His voice is high and it cracks often. Its most important feature is that it sounds believable. If Burns himself is particularly handsome, the fact was beyond my grasp, but I hope not. If he gets the applause he deserves, it would be cheapened a little if he were a heart throb. WILL KEN DITCH JENNIFER? I can see him in the tabloids now. But with any luck he'll be no more supermarket fodder than Anthony Hopkins or Ian McKellar.
If there's a problem with the film it's that it's a little TOO deliberate. And it swings from one sub-plot to another and back again and sideways, like a simple harmonic oscillator, just passing through the central story line from time to time. There are moments when it's entirely possible to forget what the movie is about.
Partly because any viewer is likely to be distracted by the gorgeous, wintry Nova Scotia settings. At time the snow is blue or yellow and seems to have leaped straight out of a post-impressionist painting. The small-town streets are choked with drifts and the village itself, which ought to be pretty dismal, looks more like a vacation snapshot. Rarely has a winter landscape had such luster.
One of the qualities that makes it so easy to recommend this is that it's made for adults -- or, more precisely, for people with an attention span that hasn't been cut off at the knees by MTV and commercials and glitzy news sound bites. You have to settle back to watch it, fold your hands behind your head, relax, and sort of slit your eyes slightly.