Review of Anamorph (2007) by Andy S — 11 Sep 2010

If we look up the word ?Anamorphosis?, from which the title of this film was derived, we get the following definition:

Anamorphosis is a distorted projection or perspective requiring the viewer to use special devices or occupy a specific vantage point to reconstitute the image. ?Ana ? morphosis? comes from the Greek words meaning ?formed again.? (Source: Wikipedia).

So it?s basically a piece of artwork that is painted in such a way that if viewed from a particular point it will make a complete picture. Unfortunately, the filmmakers didn?t get the complete picture when putting this rather poor effort together.

A troubled cop, Stan Aubray, is investigating a series of murders that are thought to be copy-cats of a killer called ?Uncle Eddie? whose case he investigated and was thought to have been killed five years previous. He is helped by his partner, Carl Uffner and art expert, Blair Collet. The art expert is needed because the killer places all of his victims in poses that depict works of art. I really can?t say much more about this one, that is the basic premise of the movie.

As I said earlier I found this a rather poor effort. I usually like the work of Willem Dafoe, but he must have seen something in the script we didn?t see on the screen, because it is very poor. The pacing is way too slow and the dialogue, with great long pauses, is pretty dire. I did like the performance of Peter Stormare as Blair Collet; he was the one bright point in this movie. I will give honourable mentions to Willem Dafoe as Stan Aubray and Scott Speedman as Carl Uffner just for making the effort and turning up to make it.

I usually enjoy a good serial killer movie, but this one is certainly not going to feature in any of my end of year awards? unless I do a top ten worst of the year! Over all, very poor and definitely NOT recommended.

My score: 3.7/10.