Is Twixt Worth Importing to Watch? A Movie Review

Director/writer: Francis Ford Coppola.

Cast: Val Kilmer, Bruce Dern and Elle Fanning.

The visions of reality are blurred in Francis Ford Coppola's Twixt. As for what that means is a director deciding to make a personal film than to produce a bankable product. Some audiences may feel confused to what this director wanted to infuse in this ghost story. Maybe he’s making a statement for career novelists to take note.

This film looks at the down and out life of Hall Baltimore (Val Kilmer), an author trying to make ends meat. Instead of penning his next great novel, he is out on the road looking for inspiration and trying to make a sale from his last great book, Witch Hunter. Everyone has had that slump period, and this writer is having more than just one bad year. After one successful book, maybe that is the only novel he will ever pen.

But when he arrives in a small town of Swann Valley, what he finds might simply be nightmare that he cannot run away from. With no surprise, the only fan in this town, the sheriff Bobby LaGrange (Bruce Dern) wants his help in solving a local mystery.

Kilmer does a great job in playing the role of a lost puppy. He plays up role of being down on his luck with ease. He’s like Steven Seagal. Both are trying to reclaim some lost glory. For some viewers, they may simply ask: “Whatever happened to the Batman?”

Seventeen long years have not treated Kilmer very well. With no surprise, he’s gained weight and the long ponytail his character sports only accentuates this idea of two middle-aged men carrying more than just some extra baggage. Baltimore looks like he has the weight of the world on him and that is effectively conveyed in Kilmer's performance. The reasons why this character is suffering are slowly revealed, and that helps make for some good character development. But maybe a few secrets should have been introduced from a different point of view at the film’s start. That way, audiences know where the movie is going instead of getting lost by a long string of reveals later on in the film.

When the dreams Baltimore experiences start to make sense, they expose a little secret that this writer is harbouring. When he actually starts to make sense of what has transpired in his sleep, the plot about solving the mysterious death of a young girl starts to take shape. Sadly, more time is spent providing a visual experience than with giving telling clues.

The duo-tones look good, but the digital nuances revealed from the green screening process is very apparent. Had more real set pieces been used, then these dream sequences would not be as harsh. At least V (Elle Fanning) gives a reasonable showing as a ghost girl. But for a truly etheric performance, Edgar Allen Poe (Ben Chaplin) deserves the real credit. He enters Baltimore's dreams with no real rhyme or reason. He is Baltimore's spirit guide.

But in a product that was re-edited after every new festival showing in 2011 by Coppola himself–as though he was unsure of his product and he needed guidance from his fans too–the final product that made it to foreign shores felt like it lacked that special oomph needed to make this product a fondly memorable Coppola classic. The imported version brought in to watch stood out as satisfactory. Audiences in North America may do better to wait for a future video release should Coppula decide on providing an extended cut, showing how he likes to fine tune his films. Or just maybe, he should simply go back to making gangster films.

Overall: 6 out of 10.

The Twixt official website is here:

The Twixt Homepage

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