The Mothman Prophecies

By Teddy Durgin
tedfilm@aol.com

Personally, there are enough aliens, flying saucers, Bigfoots, and Lochness Monsters creeping around out there-both real and imagined-that I don't really need to learn about some other strange thing that people think they're seeing. But I loved The X-Files in its heyday, and I'm still a sucker for movies starring whispering white folk afraid of the next phone call or the next wrong highway turn.

The Mothman Prophecies chronicles a series of unexplained events through the eyes of a Washington Post reporter (fortunately not the current film critic of the Post). His name is John Klein (Richard Gere), and he has the perfect life. Great job, the respect of his peers, a hot wife (Debra Messing from Will and Grace). But he's the star of a scary movie, so into his perfect life must come some harm. Wifey bites the dust in a mysterious car accident. She and John are driving back from purchasing their dream house. Suddenly, she screams and veers off the road. She thinks she saw something while driving. No, Gere fans, not a gerbil. Not a dog or cat either. It was more like ... a shadow. A figure. A dark apparition. A ... a ... Mothman!

Hey, don't laugh. It's not as silly as it sounds.

On her death bed, one of the things she says to John is: "You didn't see it, did you?" Those words set Klein on a slow, muddled journey involving odd drawings on a sketchpad, weird car rides, phone calls in the middle of the night, and unexplained phenomena in a remote West Virginia town. I'm purposely keeping the plot summary a little vague, because the movie remains quite vague for much of its running time. But that's OK. It also does a very good job of keeping its audience off balance.

As directed by Mark Pellington, The Mothman Prophecies had just the right level of strangeness to keep my mind engaged. It's creepy and confounding, not quite a mess but not quite a paragon of logic either. When it's all over, there is a lot left unexplained. But the movie's explanation for all the unexplainable things that happen is actually quite brilliant.

The explanation? It can't be explained! It is beyond our reasoning!

Congratulations, Mr. Pellington. You have idiot-proofed your movie!

My only real criticism of The Mothman Prophechies is that I wish Pellington had been a little less impressed with all the fancy camera tricks he learned between now and his last film, Arlington Road. Much of the film is actually shown from the Mothman's perspective as he flies overhead, comes up behind people, looks at them through TV sets and mirrors. The effect starts to get a little tiresome after a while.

For me, though, I was hooked early on the premise. I'm starting to really like those films that rely less on flashy visual effects and elaborate stunts and more on atmosphere and creepy cinematography. The Others is a classic example of how a movie like that can be pulled off beautifully. The Mothman Prophecies is not in that film's league, but it's not too far off either.

The movie is grounded in the low key performances of Gere, who attacks the Mothman mystery like it's a journalism assignment, and Laura Linney, as a West Virginia police officer who is skeptical of all the strange things happening around her town of Point Pleasant. Linney's Connie Parker kind of becomes Scully to Gere's Fox Mulder. Eventually, though, the Mothman sightings multiply. There is clearly some dark force at work, one that prompts Klein to seek the counsel of a Dr. Leek (Alan Bates), an expert on such out-there topics as premonitions and Mothman imagery. Leek tells Klein to beware the town. Don't go back. Multiple Mothman sightings can only mean a great tragedy is on the way.

The film ends with one "Wowsie" of a climax that I won't give away here. Suffice to say, if you're already frightened of bridges, you may be taking the long way home forever more after seeing this flick!

Why do we go to movies to be scared? In real life, fear sucks. It's probably the worst of all feelings. But fear in a movie theater can be a delicious thing. I guess because that kind of fear can be controlled, turned off. We know where the Exit signs are. We know where the doors are located. It's not like the theater manager is going to lock us in. Of course, being locked in a movie theater is the dream of some people! Not a nightmare .. uh, unless all that is showing are Freddie Prinze Jr. movies.

The Mothman Prophecies is rated PG-13 for terror, language, and some sexuality.