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Overall Rating : 3/10
Directed By : Marcel Langenegger
Hugh Jackman (X-Men)
Ewan McGregor (The Island)
Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain)
Lisa Gay Hamilton (Nine Lives)
Supplied By : Fox Home Video
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : September. 30, 2008
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| PLOT An accountant is introduced to a mysterious sex-dating club known as The List by his lawyer friend. He becomes enthralled in this new lifestyle but he soon becomes the prime suspect in a woman's disappearance and a multimillion-dollar heist. |
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| THE REVIEW In DECEPTION, Jonathan McQuarry is a seemingly hardworking account who willingly drowns himself in his work - But little does he know that his life would soon take a major change. All of this which occurs when he meets a sure-of-himself Attorney by the name of Wyatt Bose. By sheer accident or just a purposeful act by Wyatt, the two somehow end up with their cellphones swapped - and with no way to contact Wyatt. Jonathan finds himself met with the nonstop ringing of the businessman's phone. It eventually gets to the point where Jonathan decides to answer - but who's on the other end? A woman who hopes to schedule a no-strings attached sexual foray for the night. It turns out that Wyatt is involved with a sex club of sorts, which is comprised of a list of people who all seek the same kind of attention. Not knowing what he was in for, Jonathan accepts the woman's invitation on Bose's behalf. Soon this would become a nightly thing for him, as he does begin to enjoy the numerous women who are in and out night after night. His new fast life would soon come to a halt when he takes a liking to one particular member of the club, a beautiful young woman, who he only knows as "S". Although it is said to be against the club rules, the two begin to become close and personable with each other. But just when it seems that they are getting the most comfortable with each other, S mysteriously vanishes without any kind of warning. Jonathan tries to employ the services of the Police, but as much as he tries to prove that S was indeed with him, there is no psychical evidence that seem to back his claims. As time goes by it becomes more and more obvious that Wyatt is more or less in the background controlling it all, all the the means of luring an impressionable and naive Jonathan into blackmail scheme - a scheme that would gain Wyatt luxurious riches, while potentially landing Jonathan in more trouble than he ever imagine. Before going into this film, I knew very little about it other than seeing the trailer, and from the trailer, it looked like nothing more than a fairly interesting Erotic thriller in the vein of the recent direct-to-video film, IMPULSE, but with a much better cast. And like IMPULSE, DECEPTION with it's single descriptive title makes it sound like a film you're likely to find on late night cable, rather than your local theater. It's new title, which was changed to possibly avoid confusion with other flicks(it was originally titled THE LIST), does it's own harm, as it's title reveals the twist - the deception that is at the film's core, to the audience before they even began to watch the film. So right out of the gate, if you will, you anticipate what's to come, even though the film caters it to be something of a shock. So with that said, DECEPTION offers very little originality, and in the end it renders it self being your basic, stale, edgy thriller. I'll admit, that the cast does cause you to keep a slight interest in the film's proceedings, but without them, the film would be the equivalent of any "watch-once-and-forget" late night erotic films that came out prior to the new millennium. The plot starts as this daring journey, depicting a good guy's descent into the dark world without consequences, but slowly dwindles into the tired set up of a film whose focus of blackmail, and believe me, the transition isn't smooth. At a time, that I suppose the two angles were to come together as one, the two subplots, actually feel like two individual films -it's as if it goes from one story to another, because Wyatt Bose's blackmail plans, make the plot involving the sex club seem no more than a time filler, The look of the film is quite nice, as the colors are smooth and dark, almost adding more sensuality to it's erotically themed plot, and as a debut film for Director Marcel Langenegger, does a decent job of handling the film overall. However the film has many faults as mentioned, the plot is uneven at times, and seems somewhat scatterbrained. Another thing, is the films rather sluggish pace, that is bound to cause loss of interest in the film's subject, and as some have already noted, it can be quite boring at times. As for the cast, given the material, they do what they can with it. The person who kept the little interest I seemed to retain was actress Michelle Williams, who here, is as gorgeous as ever as the character of "S" although I wish her character would've had more to do. |
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| GORE
METER 1/10 Very light on gore or blood, just a gunshot wound and some blood splatter. |
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| MUSICAL
SCORE 3/10 Nothing about the score stood out to me, it seemed very routine for this type of film. |
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| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM DECEPTION is a film that starts out as being an erotically charged thriller but ends up a slow, predictable and tiresome film about the all too familiar subject of blackmail and betrayal. There are many film's out there that are nearly identical to DECEPTION, and honestly, a lot of them better. |
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