Review of Deception (2008) by Jack G — 23 Dec 2008

This is your doctor speaking to you, film: You are suffering from a somewhat acute case of Genericitis. This means, basically, that if this is a dramatic thriller, which it is, you'll hear somewhere, over the mountains, M. Night Shyamalan utter his famous phrase: "What a twist!" And, as well, that the script will involve some kind of gimmick to put the characters in, in this case the sort of underground/legal(?) world of sex clubs where people have whole lists of anonymous callers to go and have wild sex in super-pricey hotel rooms without knowing who they are. At the same time the gimmick is working through the plot's bloodstream, big doses of things like "contrivances" and "Holy shit, are these people kidding me?" theatrics. With Deception, the so-called deception can be seen within about I would say one and a half minutes of Hugh Jackman's performances (which involves, at that point, smoking up Ewan McGregor's character Jonathan with weed late at night in a high-rise office), and from there on in it's a matter of fish in the barrel for the writer and director. How long will it be before Jonathan finds himself as screwed over by Michele Williams' character (that's not a spoiler, that's a fact) and made a pawn in a not really intricate extortion scheme? Does it matter? So much of the genericitis relies upon such over-used stuff like horrid synthesizer and other music that resembles things like beats. And the best way to try and combat any generic music? Bland direction with not well times HD quality camerawork that makes Miami Vice look professional.

And really, if there is a reason at all to keep watching the movie, and sad to say for this unlicensed doctor of movies there is, it's for how hard the actors do try with the material to make it work. And, as well, for that kernel of an idea involving sex clubs that *could*, *should* be interesting, that could make for a deliciously brutal and sexually charged picture. I ended up throwing chocolate candies at the screen, sometimes in droves, not because a particular scene got my goad (which some really did, particularly some of the Madrid scenes as one realizes how stupidly short McGregor's attraction has been to Williams), but because I was still watching it. That's another thing about genericitis: like something you bring on an airplane, a book or even one of the movies available to watch, you know you should be doing something better like watching the skyline or God forbid sleeping. But it sucks one in for all the wrong reasons. The cure? Try your best to stay away and not to be lured in by things like good actors or an interesting premise. As Admiral Ackbar once exclaimed: IT'S A TRAP!