Screen Scene: “The Number 23”

“The Number 23″

Director Joel Schumacher

New Line Cinema

2 paws

Circling every 23rd word of this review will get you nothing.

“The Number 23″ is a psychological thriller and the latest film by Joel Schumacher, and his second with Jim Carrey. (The two also collaborated on the “masterpiece” that was “Batman Forever.”)

The movie opens with a frenetic credits sequence that bombards the audience with all manner of facts and coincidences pertaining to the titular number, ranging from Hiroshima to Kurt Cobain.

Carrey plays Walter Sparrow, an animal control officer who grows increasingly obsessed with a novel (titled “The Number 23″) whose narrator is eerily similar to himself.

As the novel’s protagonist spirals into a murderous madness from his fixation on the number, Walter slowly loses his grip on reality as well. Haunted by terrifying dreams and occurrences of the number, Walter fears the growing darkness within himself and for the safety of his family.

While it is an intriguing concept, “The Number 23″ struggles to develop a plot capable of supporting the movie’s already short running time. The metanarrative is bogged down in the first half by the inordinate amount of time spent hearing Walter read the novel and seeing it in his mind’s eye.

Unfortunately, the novel is a half-baked attempt at hard-boiled, film noir dialogue that evokes more laughs than anything else. If one is going to write a metanarrative, one ought to remember to save some good ideas for the story-within-the-story.

Once Walter finishes reading the novel, though, things get more interesting. As the narrative shifts gears, the movie becomes a quest to discover the source of the novel before Walter loses his sanity.

It is here where the film should have salvaged its rocky, slow start with an engaging unraveling of the mystery. And, in all fairness, the revelations do come at the audience at a fast and furious pace. Unfortunately, they’re not especially satisfying.

Schumacher has had his hits and misses in the past. Consider “The Number 23″ more disappointing than “Phone Booth” but less insulting than “Batman & Robin.”

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