MARY REILLY (27)

Directed by: Stephen Frears

Starring: Julia Roberts, John Malkovich

The Pitch: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: the chambermaid's story.

Theo Sez: Some good ideas in this reworking of Jekyll and Hyde - notably its vision of Victorian England explicitly in Jekyll's image, a time of rigid "respectability" and barely-repressed sex and violence. Some impressively textured, richly suggestive photography too, lots of fog and rain and Gothic music; but the film is stillborn, a non-idea with a blank at its centre. The eponymous heroine (as played by this rather fey star) is a classic victim, and - worst of all - barely relevant to the central story. Jekyll's forbidden love for her remains a theme undeveloped, with the result that she seems little more than a passive observer, shuttlng ever more hysterically between Jekyll and Hyde. Literate dialogue can't disguise the dearth of ideas, any more than the arty tone (exemplified by the decision, a la ORLANDO, to give Malkovich no transformation makeup for his double role) can make anything of the solemn, draggy pace that makes it feel dour and endless. Nobody's fault really - all these talented people do their best; but it's a failure.