The Ninth Gate Review

By Kimberly Sabat

Now for a review on one of the worst movies since ROSEMARY’S BABY, I give you THE NINTH GATE. Oooo, so spooky, so satanic, so… Why did they pick Johnny Depp to star in it? Oh yeah, because it will bring every Depp fan from miles away to wonder in amazement why he purposefully appeared in this movie.

Frank Langella, playing Boris Balkan, is a well known book collector who happens to have a copy of a work supposedly written by Satan. 2 other copies exist in the world and Dean Corso, Johnny Depp’s character, is taken on as the man to help him find the other books. Under the guise of attempting to authenticate his copy, Boris sends Dean across the world.

Now people are out to kill Dean, which is what I wanted to do to myself just for sitting through this movie. Turns out it is a group of Satan worshippers that need his copy to add to the others. 3 books in conjunction piece together the puzzle. I still fail to see why it won the awards it was nominated for. Oh yeah, they were European awards.

With the help of his unnamed, not so sexy, newly acquired, guardian angel, cohort, Emmanuelle Seigner, Depp plows through this movie like it was THE DA VINCI CODE, only less interesting. You’d think they would have gotten a more attractive supporting actress, right? I can’t quite put my finger on it, maybe it was the fact that the color of her eyebrows drastically differed from the color of her hair? Or maybe just the fact that they were as bushy as the 70’s porn stars are downstairs! Yuck.

The fights are lame, and the girl, as she is only known, has a fighting skill that reminds me of a high school cheerleader, with the strength of my grandma. Still she knocks over guys with one kick. Awesome. This woman is up there with names like Lara Croft, She-Ra, even Pippy Longstocking.

Oh, now Johnny gets violent! Taking a cue from that sticky woman who follows him around, he snags some metal thing in a fight scene and begins slapping red paint repeatedly into a guy’s temple. Well that is what it looks like. It isn’t too brutal, if you’re a clown.

Not only was the plot reminiscent of 40 years ago, the soundtrack reminded me of a 70’s Satan flick too. I’m positive that is what the director was going for. However, at times it went from that chilling piano tapping, to a 50’s themed comedy show. Who would have guessed?

The end scenes showed that Boris was just too lazy to do what he could pay Dean for, and we witness the ritual which will invoke the devil himself. I don’t know, in today’s world of technology, when you need an actor to show his audience what he feels, or is imagining, you can usually do it with computer graphics. It was pretty comical when Boris was unconvincingly conjuring Satan and supposedly getting all these powers; he had to say what was going on in his mind. Very 70’s.

Oops, looks like you didn’t have the right pages after all Boris. Light him aflame, and escape Dean, but not before you have sex with Girl and the camera takes it all in with a burning castle in the background. Nice boob shot though.

Once again, I am disappointed in the ending. So Johnny finds the solution to the puzzle where everyone else went wrong. And we’re to believe, by his return to the sex scene castle alone, that he conjured up the devil at the end? I guess so. There you have it, one of the worst Depp films I have ever seen since CRY BABY, and even that had it’s place. For THE NINTH GATE, I’m afraid its place is in the dumpster.

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