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Faces In The Crowd (DVD)
Year: 2011
Rating: MA
Director: Julien Magnat
Cast: Marianne Faithfull, Milla Jovovich, Julian McMahon, Michael Shanks
Release Date: November 17, 2011
Distributor: Roadshow
The Film: 3.5
FILMINK rates DVDs and Blu-rays out of 5"...Milla Jovovich is strong and the execution eye-catching."
Writer/director Julian Magnat's suspenser sounds clichéd (and builds upon familiar blind-or-visually-compromised-ladies-in-distress pics from Wait Until Dark and Blind Terror to Blink and Julia's Eyes), and yet star Milla Jovovich is strong and the execution eye-catching.
A teacher, Anna (Milla), improbably walks home alone after a night out, runs afoul of feared killer ‘Tearjerk Jack', falls off a bridge, bangs her head and awakens with a real affliction, ‘facial blindness', which means that she can't tell who anyone is and facial features change repeatedly, a bad thing for her dull partner (Michael Shanks), but a good one for the killer, who starts exploiting her problem. But never fear: Sam (bearded Julian McMahon), a grumpy detective, is on the case - and, he hopes, soon to be on Anna too.
What should be a bit of a B-movie has been given bite by this central conceit, as we see those around Anna through her eyes, and director Magnat employs strikingly tricky effects and even casts several players to fill the same role, as with a doctor introduced halfway through who's at first portrayed by Marianne Faithfull (!) and then three other actresses. And therefore, after a while, you think you're losing it too.
