Between (DVD)

Did you see Stay, the 2005 Marc Forster critical and box-office bomb? It was about a dying man trapped in a purgatory fever dream while refusing to accept the inevitable, and it unraveled as a mystery treating him as though he were indeed still among the living. If you hated that movie, you will definitely not be a fan of Between, which is basically the same story, but with much less talent behind it.

Personally, I liked Stay. I’m in for whatever Marc Forster does, and furthermore I’ll watch almost anything Ewan McGregor is in. Academy Award nominee Ryan Gosling is just icing on the cake. The supernatural mind-mix of a terror tale, with is portents of doom and everlasting gloom kept me hooked to the inevitable (and wholly expected) “he’s really dead!” end. No surprises, but an abundance of tension, talent and technique. Super stylized, ala the French New Wave: Good cinema.

On the other hand, Between stars likable yet bland TV actors (Without A Trace’s Poppy Montgomery and Cold Case’s Danny Pino) in basically the same freaky fable but shot on digital video, set in Tijuana, and helmed by an obvious first-timer. While there is some decent composition to many of the shots and the locations and sets are lovely, the flat lighting and tedious pacing cancel all that out. The acting is also a series of peaks and valleys – Montgomery holds her own, even with some pretty ridiculous dialogue, while other actors are clearly reciting lines phonetically, and still others rise above it all and give impressive mini showcase performances.

Montgomery plays Nadine (or is it Dianne? Do the anagram) an American whose estranged sister has gone missing in Mexico. They’re the only family each other has, so off she goes – packing only, it would seem, a white slip – ready to rescue. When she arrives, she’s instantly met with cynicism and opposition from the local cop (there’s apparently only one policia in TJ, and he’s none too friendly). Undaunted, Nadine checks in to a big hotel (again, manned by only one employee, also a weirdo), and calls her husband back home to let him know she’s OK. But she’s really not OK. Haunted by billowy white, running dreams, Nadine is a clue-chasing wreck by the time the story concludes.

There are a few gross-out moments for the gore hounds, but not too many. There is a pretty putrid corpse that keeps turning up, plus a few scenes in a morgue, but that’s about it. When it comes to the perv factor, you guys are out of luck: even though Montgomery’s wardrobe pretty much consists of underwear, it’s wholly concealing. And unfortunately, Robert Nelms’ script is everything but: suspense-free, the characters tell you everything via seemingly compulsory revelation.

By the time Nadine’s husband shows up in Tijuana “on business” you might wish you’d had your passport stamped in purgatory rather than have opted to put 90 minutes of wear on your DVD player.

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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson