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THE GIFT

Cate Blanchett stars as Annie Wilson, a recently widowed mother of three young boys who uses her "gift" to help support her family. That gift would be of the psychic kind, in that Annie's patrons come to her for tarot card readings wherein she dispenses advice and words of encouragement to her often-troubled clientele. Annie does apparently possess some sort of empathic psychic ability, but one gets the impression that her clients rely on her common sense and goodwill as much as they do on any more supernatural attributes.

The film takes place in a small Southern town, where Annie's abilities are regarded suspiciously by those who don't embrace her. One local redneck in particular, Donnie Barksdale (an easy-to-despise Keanu Reeves), is not very fond of his wife's dependence on Annie, and he takes to terrorizing and stalking the poor woman. At the same time, the more wealthy and ritzy around town choose to regard Annie as a gimmicky "fortune teller" young, bitchy, country club prima donna Jessica King (Katie Holmes) being chief among these naysayers.

So it's ironic that when Jessica mysteriously disappears and the police can find no trace of the missing woman, the girl's father asks for the psychic's help in finding his daughter. At first Annie is not of much use, but she soon finds herself the victim of horrible visions related to Jessica, eventually leading the police to the girl's body. Reeves' Donnie is implicated in the murder and, after the requisite courtroom scenes, is convicted for the crime. But the visions continue for Annie, who soon realizes that not only is Donnie innocent, but her own life may now be in danger too.

Billy Bob Thornton and Tom Epperson's script indulges itself in Southern stereotype characters, but it works thanks to the actors who bring the characters to life. Aside from Blanchett's perfect turn in the lead, the rest of the ensemble cast are largely fine: Giovanni Ribisi as a half-cocked local who relies on Annie to keep him sane; Reeves' good ol' boy who can't be the real villain of the piece; Greg Kinnear as the victim's good-guy fiancé; and Hilary Swank as the battered wife of Reeves' Barksdale.

Additionally, while the supernatural aspects of THE GIFT grow increasingly intense and scary, they are never over-the-top enough to negate the viewer's buying into the story. Raimi's restrained hand, which he first proved himself capable of in the equally interesting A SIMPLE PLAN, serves this slowly unraveling mystery well. And the plot twists that come at film's end work well and make sense (despite a bit of psychic legerdemain).

Psychic phenomena aside, Cate Blanchett's best moments in the film are the least fantastic ones. A subtle undercurrent that works its way through THE GIFT involves the death of Annie's husband in an accident a year earlier. While the topic is never really the focus of the picture, it seems that Annie has not come to terms with the loss and is incapable of properly helping her troubled son deal with the situation as well. This thread permits the film to avoid the typical transparency that is rampant in thrillers, for Blanchett's character truly comes alive during her moments of quiet sadness and eventual catharsis.

The film does lose its momentum during the above-mentioned courtroom scenes, but they are necessary to the plot and Raimi does his best to get through them quickly. Another complaint might be the inclusion of a few too many possible suspects - poor Gary Cole comes to mind, in particular. He was the actual bad guy in A SIMPLE PLAN, and Raimi seems to have fun with the notion of casting him again here as yet another villain.

Paramount's DVD is somewhat bare bones. The transfer is widescreen anamorphic with Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and 2.0 Stereo Surround audio options. The disc's animated main menu is sort of spooky, but the only extras here are a trailer, a music video (Neko Case & Her Boyfriends' "Furnace Room Lullaby"), and a segment with cast and crew interviews. The latter, called THE GIFT: A LOOK INSIDE, runs about 10 minutes long and is interesting enough as these things go. Raimi and several cast members kick in bits of info about the film's production, and thankfully the segment avoids the "shameless self-promotion" that is often the case with these sorts of things. Unfortunately, there is no director's commentary on this DVD... But look at it this way: If Raimi took the time out of his schedule to prepare and record a commentary, we'd be that much further away from a SPIDER-MAN release!