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All-Reviews.com Movie/Video Review
One Hour Photo
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  out of 4
| *Also starring: | Michael Vartan, Gary Cole, Eriq LaSalle, Dylan Smith, Erin Daniels |
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Review by Susan Granger
3½ stars out of 4
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It's Robin Williams' devastating performance that distinguishes this
chilling psychological character study. With blond hair, thick glasses,
compressed lips and soft voice, Williams is almost unrecognizable as Sy Parrish,
the nebbishy manager of a one-hour photo in a suburban Sav-Mart who muses
ominously: "You never take a photograph of something you want to forget."
Because his real life is so totally emotionally barren, Parrish fantasizes about
the photographs he develops, particularly the Kodak moments he glimpses of an
attractive young wife and mother (Connie Nielsen) and her young son (Dylan
Smith). But "there's more to it than meets the eye." Soon he becomes so obsessed
with snapshots of the seemingly perfect, upper-middle-class Yorkin family that
he evolves into an invasive, knife-wielding stalker, catching the neglectful
husband (Michael Vartan) in the act of adultery. "Snapshot," he explains, "was
originally a hunting term." You've got to credit actor Robin Williams with
courage, transforming himself into the demented kiddy-TV host in "Death to
Smoochy," then the homicidal novelist in "Insomnia," now this eerie, alienated,
eccentric character. Hopefully, Oscar voters will remember to nominate this
skillful performance when the ballots are sent out next year. Kudos also to
writer/director Mark Romanek's meticulous visual style (he was Madonna's music
video director for "Bedtime Story"), plus Jeff Cronenweth's cinematography and
Tom Foden's stark production design. And notice that the Yorkin family name
cleverly breaks into what Sy envisions as "your kin." On the Granger Movie Gauge
of 1 to 10, "One Hour Photo" is a scary, unsettling, adult 8. It's such a dark,
disturbing psychodrama that it could push me into buying a digital camera.
Copyright © 2002 Susan Granger
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