The Number 23

The Number 23 (La Revelacion) [NTSC/REGION 1 & 4 DVD. Import-Latin America]
$25.99
SINOPSIS: Narra la historia de un hombre obsesionado con un libro, cuyo relato parece describir detalles de su vida ���ntima. El hombre comenzar��� a sentirse amenazado y desarrolla una paranoia por un n���mero que se repite una y otra vez en todo el libro: el 23. DESCRIPTION: Jim Carrey as a schizophrenic murderer isn't convincing, in this melodramatic film about a man obsessed by the Number 23. Joel Schumacher (Batman Forever, St. Elmo's Fire) has unintentionally managed to make a comedy of horrors that really is quite humorous in parts. Walter Sparrow (Carrey) becomes engrossed in a homespun novel about Detective Fingerling, whose life degrades into mayhem because of his obsession with 23's esoteric numerical puzzles. Sparrow's preoccupation with the book follows his botched attempt to catch a nasty dog that bites him, leading one to believe that Sparrow's contraction of rabies might be the cause for his mental degradation. As the story progresses, Sparrow retreats further into Fingerling's world, rife with suicidal sexpots and hardboiled detective sleuthing. His wife, Agatha (Virginia Madsen), also plays Fingerling's girlfriend, sex-crazed Fabrizia, who taunts Fingerling until he stabs her. Back in reality, Walter aims to solve the unresolved crimes in the book, taking it as a murderer's diary rather than as an imagined work. The story is half-baked, though Carrey's portrayal of a mentally disturbed person is what makes The Number 23 comedic. Long, contemplative stares, and over-dramatized acting renders Sparrow a clich���d character, rather than one odd enough to engage viewers. For a better version of almost the exact plot but with a terrorist's twist, see Thr3e instead. --Trinie Dalton

The Number 73304-23-4153-6-96-8
$28.95
How long can you spend reading a book without words? Quite a bit, it turns out, and when the book is as good as The Number 73304-23-4153-6-96-8, you can see why. You can lose yourself for long spells in each lush image on every page.

Writer and illustrator Thomas Ott sets the tone early. His detailed, line-filled black-and-white drawings recall film noir, and his "Twilight Zone"-like tale of obsession and greed creeps steadily along to a conclusion you know must come but desperately hope to avoid.

With no words or dialogue, Ott's unnamed protagonist, an electric chair operator for the local prison, arrives at work to do his job. From the executed prisoner's last possession, his Bible, falls a strip of paper with the numbers 73304-23-4153-6-96-8 printed on it. Their meaning is lost, but the executioner keeps the paper anyway, and soon he notices their importance. Everything in his life is running on a pattern, the numbers repeating in strange and unexpected ways: a dog tag, a phone number, an address, a sequence of winning numbers on a roulette wheel.

Unable to resist the temptation of using this numerical foreknowledge for his own gain, he falls prey to his own vices. This is where The Number 73304-23-4153-6-96-8 truly begins to shine, as a smart morality tale with a devious twist. It works as a sharp allegory to the notion that people see what they want to see, form patterns where they wish them to appear, and surrender logic to passion. Those patterns repeat, seemingly on an endless loop, and while it appears to be a wonderful progression at first, the horror of the entire situation slowly dawns on reader and protagonist alike.

Ott has a wonderful way of capturing the mysterious beauty of the unknown through the eyes of his everyman. In the timeless era in which the story is set, nothing feels real, yet everything is as familiar as the back of one's hand. There's an overwhelming sense of danger lurking just somewhere in the edges, hidden in the shadows of these drawings, pervading every scene with that terrible prescient feeling things are far different from what they seem and that everything will be changing soon. Even the passage of time is shrouded in mystery, or at least obscured.

Sustaining this ominous feeling throughout the entire story is a difficult task, but Ott manages it with ease. Credit his natural ability to tell a story in pictures with keeping this ambitious project from ever sinking to the level of trite. With or without words, The Number 73304-23-4153-6-96-8 is a story to be savored--and one that resonates.

-- John Hogan

The Number 23
$15.98
I'm always excited when Jim Carrey plays is straight, having witnessed his superb performances in films like The Truman Show, Man on the Moon, and The Majestic; however, his run of dramatic successes had to end eventually - and end it did, with director Joel Schumacher's paranoiac thriller The Number 23. Carrey plays oridinary family man Walter Sparrow, a dog catcher for the Department of Animal Control, with a loving wife Agatha (Virginia Madsen), and a teenage. However, after Agatha buys an odd novel with the central premise concerning the number 23 as a birthday gift for Walter, his life quickly unravels: he becomes obsessed with the story, believing the mystery about the number 23 to be true, and finding many coincidences and parallels between the book and his own life. Harry Gregson-Williams' music creates an unsettling aural world of fear and confusion. Nervous, skittery string work overlaid with a plethora of moody electronic effects build an atmosphere of chaos and suspicion. Martin Tillman's electric cello, plus various other wailing string instruments, keep the listener teetering on the edge of sanity, while being called beyond it by sampled cooing choral effects. "Fingerling's Childhood" offers the album's only melodic respite, and thereafter the score settles down into a rhythm of muted orchestral performances overlaid by electronic percussion, sampled vocal effects, and surprisingly effective ethnic flutes, which somehow give the score an unusual, exotic tinge. It's not easy listening by any means - the score is dense, and claustrophobic, and never really allows the listener chance to process the off-kilter noises, but its effective in context. The conclusive cue, "Atonement", while remaining true to the style of the score which preceded it, adopts a darkly satisfying orchestral sweep to bring things to a fine finish.

Anamorph, the Number 23 : Killer Thriller 2 Pack Collection
$5.99
dvd set