The Nines, 2007

It is a nicely-made bit of mysterious pop-philosophy, vaguely in "The Sixth Sense" territory. I am afraid it betrays its ambitious (relative to fun movie standards) idea-scrounging about the nature of reality (or the "marking" of souls) in the last ninety seconds when it shows that it may have, at base, nothing more than a heart of spun-saccharine---a housewife's mere daydream. Too bad. OK, so just ignore that part--maybe desperate writer seeks ending and tacks on perky closure; or maybe it was forced upon him, like the writer in the movie itself. The preceding 98 minutes are a compensatorily diverting movie about mystery and alternate worlds. You know, classically (in movie terms at least) "eerie" unknown things: (whoo-oooohah) the astounding powers of great minds (and/or arresting personalities), the infinity of imagination, how and why people invent "gods" of heaven and earth, etc. etc. All that kept me watching. True, at one mid-to-late point I thought it wobbled momentarily perilously close to becoming what seemed a over-inflated but mundane intervention/recovery parable. I am obliged to say if it had been, I guess there would be nothing wrong with that , as Seinfeld would once have said. Very good cast, including a Lisa Kudrow near-twin (which sort of fits the "who am I really" theme, come to think of it). I slightly knew Ryan Reynolds as a sitcom actor, but he shows appealing versatility here, and the rest of the triple-role-playing actors are also very good. Maybe metaphysics-lite, but you could do worse. 3.5 stars. 1.09

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