CriticSociety- film reviews

Review

Dot the I

Director

Matthew Parkhill

Year

2003

Rating

Reviewed by

José Ruiloba a.k.a. Morris

Review date

Tuesday, June 08, 2004

When Dot the I premiered at the Sundance Film Festival many filmgoers proclaimed it was the new Memento. Being a big fan of Mexican actor Gael García Bernal and an even bigger fan of the aforementioned movie, my curiosity suddenly awakened. Now, we all know those film festival audiences can be a bit overenthusiastic sometimes, and I think that's just case with this movie, for even if it’s good, it ain’t near the level of greatness I had come to expect.

Barnaby (James D'Arcy) just proposed to his girlfriend Carmen (Natalia Verbeke). She isn't so sure about saying yes, but ultimately does because she's suffered too much in the past and needs that feeling of protection. Or perhaps she does love Barnaby. But everything is put in question when she meets Kit (Gael García Bernal) in her bachelor party. A kiss changes everything, and a love triangle soon emerges that will lead to unexpected consequences.

That plot summary sounds sooo lame, I know. While watching the movie I started wondering what was so special about it. It was a common love triangle like we've seen countless times in countless movies. But I kept watching, the characters kept me enthralled one way or another. And then, an hour later, a bang! There's a plot twist that changes everything and the movie suddenly becomes another thing altogether.

Now, I love plot twists, I do. And I knew there would be one in this movie before even watching it, so I was eagerly anticipating it. There are clues that lead you to it, but it's almost impossible to guess what is actually going on even if you're the smartest person on Earth. But that's not to say the plot twist is especially great. It isn't. It's fun and makes you think about everything you witnessed for the past hour. But what makes the movie especially intriguing is the fact that it doesn't end there, it continues! We see what happens to the characters after we find out about the plot twist and it's very interesting to say the least. The surprises just keep coming.

Truth be told, the movie is not very believable, and it isn't particularly well directed. I got the feeling that it was an amateurish movie. But it mostly worked, so I stopped thinking about that after a while.

Gael García Bernal is perhaps the better-known actor in the movie, and he takes full advantage because he's excellent. His English accent comes and goes, but overall it is a well-calibrated performance. Ditto for Verbeke. Only quibble has to be D'Arcy, who is good most of the time, but goes excessively over-the-top in some of the later scenes.

Overall, an interesting movie that resounds now more than ever.

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