Gothika (2003)

Summary

A criminal psychologist wrestles with a ghostly mystery after being locked up for a murder she doesn't remember committing.

Director

Mathieu Kassovitz

Downey Factor

Low to medium.

Character

Dr. Peter Graham, a therapist and colleague of Halle Berry.

Looks

Not his best although the hair, glasses and youthful wardrobe work hard to save him.

Performance

Typical Downey (if there is such a thing). He brings a likable charm to a suspicious character.

Love & Sex

Has a crush on Halle Berry, but that's it.

Dies, Gay or Villain

No, no, no.

Cast

Halle Berry, Penélope Cruz, Charles S. Dutton

Connection

John Carroll Lynch in Zodiac

RDJ Says

Gothika was like this: go to Montreal, fall in love. Play squash. Tell the person you've fallen in love with that you're in love with them. Have her say "Don't talk to me until we're done shooting." Play squash. Oh yeah. Shoot the movie ... [Halle Berry wanted me cast] so in case it sucked, it would be my fault too ... Joel Silver said, "Read this." That's kinda appealing. He said that Halle was doing it. Then I decided I'd do it before I read it. And then I read it, and I enjoyed it. I really did ... When we were working, you wouldn't have known [that Halle Berry] wasn't crazy. She was really down with her method and you have to admire that. It was almost exhausting to watch her gear herself up to do what she had to do. It's kind of like watching a great athlete train. You say, "I'd really like to hit the tape and win that race" but I wouldn't have gotten myself in that kind of shape to do that for that space of time. But I've been there, and I know what that's like to work like that ... I had some really good theater arts teachers and they always said to have aesthetic distance. If you have a fight scene, you're acting a fight scene. You're not out there really like throwing down because it will look good on the camera and keep things very real. I'm like, let's keep things very manageable and effective ... I'm so glad that I was sober when [Halle Berry's arm was broken] or everything on earth would be my fault ... It was just a really weird thing because things had been so tense on the set for days before ... Things were getting really wild and I was really shaken up and I was nervous that someone was going to get hurt. And I'd been expressing that. So when it happened, I felt two things: A) I was right, and B) what I couldn't have imagined was that it would've been at my hands that it happened, so I don't know how to explain it. It's so difficult to figure out why events occur ... The script was always changing. [My character] was reduced ... He's like this really left-wing kind of supershrink logistician. Everything is about what he's learned and what he knows, and he's always looking at the landscape with this real objectivity.

Gossip

As referenced above, 2 things happened: he met his wife Susan and apparently unaware of his own strength, he broke Halle Berry's arm.

Availability

Released in theaters 21 November 2003. On DVD in Region 1, 2 and 3; also on Blu-Ray. Special Edition DVD available in Region 1.

Foreign Titles

Argentina: En Compañía del Miedo (In the Company of Fear)
Brazil: Na Companhia do Medo (In the Company of Fear)
Mexico: En compañía del miedo espíritus ocultos (In the Company of Fear, Hidden Spirits)

Rotten Tomatoes

15% Fresh | 162 Reviews

Critical View

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Robert Downey Jr.—no doubt realizing that he's one bomb away from a guest arc on Scrubs—does his best to add some levity. But [isn't] around enough to make much of an impact.

Manohla Dargis, Los Angeles Times: How anyone in the cast manages to keep a straight face is one of the film's innumerable mysteries.

A.O. Scott, The New York Times: About two-thirds of the way through the screening I attended, the startled gasps were replaced by laughter, as Gothika began its headlong descent into incoherence.

Does It Hold Up

This movie happened at a moment in time when Robert Downey Jr was coming off a long stretch of very public drug and legal problems that made it difficult for him to get movie roles because insurance companies viewed him as too big of a risk. Which is to say, it was a big deal that he was cast in anything even if it was a lousy, disposable horror movie.

2 Reasons to See It

1. Downey is your Dr. Feelgood.
2. In between figuring out predictable twists, you like to be startled by owls that fly in the day time.

Overall

Thoroughly stupid mishmash of cheap tricks that somehow masquerade as a horror film.

If You Like It

You might also like In Dreams (1999), Natural Born Killers (1994), carnival haunted houses

Photos

Video