Review of In the Electric Mist (2009) by Slade S — 03 Oct 2009
Does a decent enough job of the book...much better than the other attempt to adapt a James Lee Burke book - Heaven's Prisoner. Burke is a great writer... he is also a crime writer, but a writer he is first and foremost unlike many popular authors out there today (as Bukowski once said: God made a lot of poets but not a lot of poetry).
In Burke you often find a lot of poetry, especially about place but also about the inner workings of the human soul. Tommy Lee Jones does a good job playing a the complex lead character, showing the struggle within that Dave has with maintaining control, with sanity, and with his past.
You can tell that Jones has read more Burke than this one book, because he becomes the character well...and would not have thought him right for the roll. The movie as a whole wanders a bit...so what.
..so does the book....so does any good novel. The trick is to bring it all back home and weave it all together in the end. A good book is often like painting from the corned in to the center...once you are there, often at the end, you can step back and finally see the whole picture.
In many ways this movie is like that. That pisses people off. Some people think movies have an obligation to be "entertaining" on a very basic level and not do much to challenge the viewer. Well if you want to be spoon fed than this movie will have too much plot for you (even sub plots.
.). But if you want a good mystery with excellent and original characters shaped by sharp dialogue..well then yes this movie is a good pic.
This review of In the Electric Mist (2009) was written by Slade S on 03 Oct 2009.
In the Electric Mist has generally received mixed reviews.
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