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When I first
saw the trailer in the theatre for “The
Forgotten”, my interest was immediately
piqued. There is just something about psychological
sci-fi thrillers that get me going. The
imagery in the trailer was especially enthralling,
and the fact that Julianne Moore was the
star just upped the ante for me. Moore is
a terrific actress, and I can generally
count on her to deliver a powerful performance
even in the most rudimentary of films.
Over the years, I’ve learned the memory
is a highly subjective animal. What we remember
is not always an exact representation of
what was. But, is it possible to have a
memory so strong of the existence of a person
that never existed? That, in part, is the
premise of “The Forgotten.”
Julianne Moore stars as Telly, a woman who
has spent the last fourteen months of her
life grieving over the death of her 9-year
old son, Sam. It is a pain and anguish that
I never wish on any parent. But her sanity
soon comes into question as she is told
by her husband that they never even had
a son.
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Thinking everyone else is insane, Telly searches
for proof that Sam did exist and she isn’t
crazy, unfortunately that proof is nowhere to
be found. Never giving up, she soon finds herself
caught in the middle of a mind-shattering conspiracy.
I’ll have to admit the first half hour of
the movie, while interesting, just wasn’t
grabbing my attention. But once it got going,
the going was good. I don’t want to give
away any plot points here due to all the twists,
but suffice to say the film kept me guessing all
the way to the end. I became as determined to
find out the truth as Telly was.
As I expected, the high point of the film was
Moore’s performance. Her reaction to the
death of her son is emotionally draining, a reaction
I can only hope to never experience. Fortunately,
she was complimented by the rest of the cast.
Gary Sinise, Alfre Woodward and Anthony Edwards
all delivered strong performances and helped to
keep an otherwise fantastic story grounded in
reality.
The DVD comes fully loaded with a commentary by
director Joseph Ruben and writer Gerald DiPego.
The two seems quite relaxed behind the microphone
and share quite a bit of interesting information
about the film. They touch on everything from
the importance of some of the locations to their
mutual admiration of Julianne Moore as an actress.
There are also a couple of deleted scenes, including
one that was an alternate ending. This alternate
ending was intriguing in that I honestly can’t
say which I preferred, the one they used or this
one. You do have the choice, by the way to view
these scenes separately, or you can watch an Extended
Version of the film that adds them back in.
You’ll also find 2 separate featurettes.
The first, “On the Set” runs about
15 minutes and comes across as one of those promo
pieces where everyone pats each other on the back.
There’s some good information here, but
nothing too deep. The following featurette “Remembering
the Forgotten” runs a bit longer and delves
into much deeper territory in terms of where the
idea came from as well as giving viewers a little
bit of a look at how the film was made.
“The Forgotten” is certainly not the
best film of its kind, but it was good enough
and had enough of an emotional impact to hold
my interest for the night and to talk about it
quite a bit the next day.
Directed by: Joseph Ruben
Starring: Julianne Moore, Dominic West, Gary Sinise,
Alfre Woodard, Linus Roache, Anthony Edwards
Extras: Director and Writer Commentary, Deleted
Scenes, “The Making of “The Forgotten”,
Alternate Ending, Remembering “The Forgotten”
Specifications: Widescreen (1.85:1) Enhanced for
16x9 Televisions, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound
Studio: Sony / Columbia Tristar
Release Date: 1/18/2005
Region 1
MPAA Rating: PG-13 (Intense Thematic Material,
Some Violence and Brief Language)
Website
We'll give The Forgotten a B.
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