Film Reviews

Secret Window

• Rating:
• Director: David Koepp.
• Starring: Johnny Depp, John Turturro, Maria Bello, Kyle Allatt, Len Cariou, Charles Dutton, Gillian Ferrabee, Timothy Hutton, Richard Jutras, Ving Rhames.
• Details: US / 96 mins / (15PG).

Based on the Stephen King novella, Secret Window sees Johnny Depp returning to darker territory after the multi-plex friendly antics of Captain Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean. Here he plays Mort Rainey, an author going through a tremendous bout of writer's block. Much of this could be down to the fact that his marriage to Amy (Maria Bello) is after falling part and the divorce is looking messy. Having shut himself away from the world in a log cabin where he doesn't seem to do much beyond sleeping, Morty's plight worsens when he receives a visit from John Shooter (John Turturro). An imposing figure, Shooter tells Mort he knows that he's plagiarised his book and gives him three days to right the wrong or else bad things will happen. Very bad things. So far, so good. But from an interesting opening 30 minutes, Secret Window never really manages to regain its momentum, failing to satisfactorily explore its intriguing premise. Written by its director, the pacing is slovenly and although there's a fair smidgen of style associated with Secret Window (see the technically awesome opening shot), there's little in the way of spark and Koepp's direction is flaccid. Indeed, by the time the unconvincing finale wheels around, even old Johnny Depp looks bored.

Review by Garreth Murphy