The Cry of the Owl ( Der Schrei der Eule )

The Cry of the Owl is a slow-boiling psychological thriller that doesn't offer the nonstop suspense that "Seven" might, but still delivers by the film's end.

The movie is based on a 1962 novel by Patricia Highsmith, who also wrote the novel that "The Talented Mr. Ripley" film was based on. Cry of the Owl was eventually shot as a movie in 1987 by a French director, and was finally re-shot in Canada in 2009. What stands out about this version is the cast, which includes Julia Stiles and British actor Paddy Considine.

I've long been a fan of Considine, and he plays the neurotic Robert Forrester brilliantly. I've seen Considine in a number of roles where he plays an assertive character, so it's interesting to see him as a shell of a man and something of a coward. This was also my first introduction to the stunningly beautiful Caroline Dhavernas, who plays Forrester's sadistic ex-wife.

The plot overview for this movie by Amazon is a bit sensational, particularly in which character is ultimately labeled a stalker. The film starts quite slow, but eventually pulls you in with the bizarre psychological problems most of the major characters seem to deal with. It's not until the second half of the film that the story picks up steam, and you're thrown unpredictable moments and twists along the way. There's a great deal of foreshadowing used in the movie, which seems appropriate considering the superstitions surrounding owls.

Cry of the Owl is not "Silence of the Lambs", so if you're looking for a constant thrills with a crystal-clear ending, this isn't it. I found it to be intriguing and suspenseful, with dark psychological undertones as the film hit its stride. While the conclusion isn't open-ended, it allows the audience to make their own interpretation of the story and the true significance of its characters.

My guess is that people will either love or hate this film, depending on their appeal to film noir. I thought it was a step above your average Redbox rental, and I think anyone who enjoys psychological thrillers should watch it at least once.

You can tell this is a Canadian-made movie, even apart from the skyline shot of Toronto and the nationality of the actors. You can tell it's Canadian by the almost modest, unassuming way in which the murder unfolds.

Then too, any murder or murder plot is almost secondary in the film. This is more a visual essay about coming to a crossroads, about the fatefulness of going in one direction rather than the other. It's about how we start out taking in life from one perspective, then end up starring back at that person we used to be.

There are several of these telling reversals in the film. The man who starts out being a sort of harmless stalker ends up being harmlessly stalked. The watcher ends up being watched.

This film might almost be a bit too low-key for many American audiences, and Paddy Considine, the lead actor, might come across as being almost too unprepossessing and inarticulate. But "Cry of the Owl" leaves a wistful trace of wondering in the air. It's like the faint and elusive scent of violets. We can't be quite sure where it's coming from or what it means. However it touches us somehow and wafts into our memories.

The script for this movie was based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith, the same author who wrote "The Talented Mr. Ripley" chronicle. There's no commentary on the DVD.

The novels of Patricia Highsmith have been turned often into cinema with varying degrees of success: "Strangers on a Train"; "Purple Noon"; "The Talented Mr. Ripley". So I was intrigued by this, a Highsmith story with which I was not familiar. The two lead actors, Paddy Considine & Julia Stiles, share a "Bourne" connection: Julia of course, played 'Nicky' in all three Bourne movies, Considine's best-known role is probably that of the tabloid journalist that gets gunned down in a London train station in an early setpiece in "Bourne Ultimatum". Here, Considine regrettably quashes his native English accent as Robert Forrester, a man who has just gone through a bitter divorce & moves to a small, unnamed town & takes a new job to get away from associations of his ex-wife. Though the nondescript locations are meant to suggest the Midwest (Highsmith set it in Pennsylvania), one can tell by the accents of the supporting actors that it was actually filmed in Canada.

Robert is deeply unhappy & emotionally fragile . . .just prior to the divorce, he'd had a pretty bad mental breakdown, and now he's living alone in a tiny rented house in Nowheresville. On his drive home from work, he comes across Jenny's (Julia Stiles) house, set in a rather remote rural area, and is drawn by the lights on in her rooms & the pretty picture of happy domesticity she presents as she goes about her homely tasks: cooking, having dinner with her boyfriend. Robert is a nightly visitor to Jenny's, and although his motives are not sinister, try explaining that to the young woman when she catches him prying. Despite this unpromising meeting, the two feel a kinship with one another from the start. Jenny is lonely, too, in a smothering relationship with a violent man and as is revealed gradually bit by bit, emotionally fragile herself. In fact, her emotional clinginess soon feels to Robert like stalking, somewhat turning the tables on him. Is the angelic-looking Jenny his Angel of Mercy or a bad omen? As misfortunes begin to pile up, and the hapless yet innocent Robert is in precisely the right place at the wrong time to appear responsible for a string of mysterious deaths, we begin to wonder.

Despite a promising premise, this movie never quite realized its potential. Both lead actors have been far more dynamic in other roles. Considine's nervous, sad-sack low affect is appropriate to his shell-shocked character, but Stiles is almost a nonentity as Jenny, lacking in visual or dynamic energy. Maybe the dreary weather was getting to the actors .. the unrelenting gray palette and monotone line readings certainly got to me. Caroline Dhavernas provides a dash of color as Robert's sadistic ex-wife (ironically named 'Nicky'). The ending is unexpected, which is saying something for a movie that barely held my interest in the getting there. Having not read the Highsmith novel of the same name, I can't say whether it is a faithful adaptation, but it's a bit of a miss.