A film review by Sam Floeter Copyright © 1999 Sam Floeter

The Messenger, I'm sorry to say, was quite possibly my greatest disappointment of the week. It hurts me to say that, because I have such respect for Luc Bessons previous work, ("The Professional," "La Femme Nikita," "The Fifth Element").

The Messenger follows the tragic life of Frances most famous martyr, Joan of Arc. I'm sure you've heard all about her in your history class so I wont regurgitate the obvious. Much of the storys details are, of course, fabricated. The problem is that they are noticably fabricated. I believe that Mr. Besson was trying to make a dramatic action film in the vein of more successful attempts such as "Braveheart." Unfortunately, his creation comes off more like a twisted parody of "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" with a tragic ending.

Milla Jovovich's portrayl of the doomed teenage war heroine is nothing short of excellent, however, I think that her dramatic, often maniacal behavior serves to do more harm than good by making the character inaccessable and downright unlikable at times, there by alienating the audience. I think that the main problem here is the script, namely the dialogue. It is extremely terse and choppy, often times bordering on lethargy.

The movie tries to compensate for this in a way by introducing character cliches that the audience can identify with and laugh at. The gentle giant, the handsome and overprotective guard, the brutal killer with a sense of humor, and of course the army commander who is a stickler for protocol. Once again though, these characters fail to divert attention away from the banality of the plot and instead only succeed in adding to the complete unrealism of the story. The audience is left thinking, should I be laughing or crying? I am also sad to say that I was thoroughly unimpressed by Dustin Hoffmans dead pan monologue as I was with John Malkovich's portrayl of the insecure king. I would have expected more from these two actors, it was almost as if they didn't even want to be there. And who knows? Maybe they didn't.

In the end, I left the theatre encapsulated by a bunch of stone faced viewers who's chant for the evening soon became "That sucked."

	Running Time: 155 Min | Rated R | US Release: November 12th | More >>

Related Links:

• Official Site
• Milla Jovovich fan site
• Unofficial The Messenger Site
• Upcomingmovies.com: The Messenger: TSoJoA