Search - Darkness Falls on DVD

Elizabeth B. (bethieof96) from NINETY SIX, SC
Reviewed on 2/17/2014...

The arrival of a mysterious stranger at a posh home on the Isle of Man is the first act in a tale of suspense and surprises, as he proceeds to hold the yuppie couple inside the house hostage and the past tragedy that links them is revealed. Compelling drama.

2 of 2 member(s) found this review helpful.

Sherilyn Fenn can act?

Kelly R. Short | Oklahoma City, OK United States | 08/06/2003

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I think the other review is of another movie. There is no flying tooth farie in this movie. Darkness Falls is your typical three person play type movie. I revolves around three people and you have a few outside scenes to help set up the story line. Sally Driscoll (Sherilyn Fenn) is a wealthy wife of a busnessman who makes shady deals. One day a stranger shows up at there house on the day that the husband has a very important diner meeting to try to get some money for a deal when a stranger shows up who is desperat to find out what happend to his wife. As the night goes on the Driscolls realize that this person is not a stranger at all.
It is relativly suspensful as most of these types of films are, but it is not my favorit type of film. On the other hand Sherilyn Fenn still looks good and does a very good job."

Darkness Falls: 3.5 stars

speed_on_wheelz | 06/18/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"John Barrett (Ray Winstone) wants answers from couple Mark and Sally Driscoll (Tim Dutton and Sherilyn Fenn), so he keeps them both hostages in their own home. As the movie goes on we find out that Mark had an affair with John's wife, who he met at a fancy dinner with Sally. When Mark drives Jane (John's wife) home, she becomes clingy and doesn't wanna leave him. As a result, Tim drives them both in a ditch, killing Jane. Well Jane didn't die instantly, but she was in a coma. Jane is pregnant with Tim's child, and she manages to deliver the baby okay, in a coma and all (baby delivered by c-section).

This is a really good movie! The acting was great, and it was very believable. Recommended.
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Good cast, decent script, bad director.

Robert P. Beveridge | Cleveland, OH | 06/23/2010

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Darkness Falls (Gerry Lively, 1999)

Darkness Falls has suddenly become a very popular name for films; since 1998, at least six movies containing that phrase in the title have been made (including two, yes two, 2006 movies entitled When Darkness Falls, a Finnish thriller from Anders Nilsson and an Australian indie mystery). I'm not 100% certain, but I also seem to recall at least one book with that name being made into a movie with a different title; just can't remember it off the top of my head. In any case, when you grab something called Darkness Falls, you never know what you're going to get. The one I ended up with is a 1999 British thriller with a stunning cast and a really, really bad director (Lively has since been responsible for such immortal celluloid as Dungeons and Dragons: Wrath of the Dragon God and The Art of War III: Retribution, while in his capacity as a cinematographer he has lensed equally brilliant movies such as Future Shock and Hellraiser: Bloodline). Could have gone either way, I guess. And when you get right down to it, it kind of did.

Adapted by John Howlett (the last writing credit to date for the man behind Lindsay Anderson's immortal If...) from a play by N. J. Crisp (one of the writers for much-loved British TV drama Secret Army), Darkness Falls is the tale of the Driscolls, Mark (The Bourne Identity's Tim Dutton) and Sally (Twin Peaks' Sherilynn Fenn). We learn in the opening scene that Mark is involved with some very bad people, and he's hosting a dinner party this night to try and raise some money to get them off his back. But while he's on his way home, a neighbor, John Barrett (the indomitable Ray Winstone, recently of Edge of Darkness... playing much the same character, now that I think about it), drops in to see Sally, and hangs around for Mark... at which point he imprisons them in a room and lays out a theory that Mark was in the car on the day Barrett's wife suffered a horrible car accident that's left her in a coma. From here, if you've seen Twelve Angry Men, you've got a pretty good idea where this is going.

It's not a bad little movie, truly. It certainly could have been worse. While Sherilyn Fenn made some choices that seemed bad at the time (Boxing Helena, which is not nearly as awful as everyone makes it out to be, and Two Moon Junction, which is), she's always been a capable actress, not to mention a very attractive one, and the ten years between Twin Peaks and Darkness Falls did nothing to blunt her appeal on either front. Ray Winstone has been a go-to actor among those in the know for a long, long time now (while the double-whammy of Nil by Mouth and Face in 1997 really brought him into the public consciousness, he's been around long enough to have acted in Quadrophenia), and once again he shows why. The only really flat performance comes from Dutton, and even he shows few glimmers of life in flashbacks, but not enough to propel the film. Which brings up an interesting idea; had Lively done more to examine the developing relationship between Sally and John, this could have not only been a cracking suspense flick, but a much more original one than it is. Still, Fenn and Winstone do their best, and while you can't say there's a surprise ending (after all, there are only two possible ways to answer the question, so half of you will have it right before you pop the movie into the DVD player), the journey's the thing, and it's not a bad one. Worth checking out. ** ½
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