The Ninth Gate A Movie Review	MPAA Rated - R It's 1:45 Long A Review by The Dude on the Right

"The Ninth Gate" stars Johnny Depp as a book investigator, hooked on finding out if this Ninth Gate of the Devil something-or-other book is authentic, because somehow, with it, you are supposed to be able to conjure up the devil himself, or so we assume. To check on the authenticity he has to go to a couple of European countries and check the other copies. He is put on this mission by a collector of devil books, who, well, in the end wants to hang out with the devil. Boy is he an idiot in how he goes about it. Anyway, Depp isn't alone on his quest, as the crazy chick wants the book so she can lead a demon chant group. She has her henchman go after Depp, but Depp has a guardian girl following him around, saving his ass a couple of times, and helping Depp on his quest.

Okay, the story is more involved that that, and the thought of some book being able to conjure up the devil could have many possibilities, but "The Ninth Gate" just showed me that Roman Polanski is stuck in the 70's, tries to be too artsy, and doesn't let and story with potential be as spooky as it could be. A couple of cases in points. One - lack of any suspense. Let's see, you've got Depp checking out the one book, in a wheelchair-bound ladies’ library, when we see the lady is missing, there's a screen shot of the door, and shot of the back of Depp's head, and yes, wham, Depp gets bipped on the bean and the wheelchair lady ends up dead. Another lack of suspense – Depp gets away from the bad guy by going down some stairs, isn't followed, and low and behold as he goes up a different set of stairs, yep, there's the bad guy again. So I've got a couple of total lacks of suspense going, making me just groan when the inevitable happens, but that wasn't the worst of it - let's talk music. All I could really think most of the times as the music tried to be suspenseful was "The Pink Panther." There's Depp, investigating around, and this cheesy music reminiscent of "The Pink Panther" just made me chuckle. I then saw Depp as Inspector Clouseau stumbling around and somehow solving the mystery.

Now, I know Polanski is supposed to be a great film maker, and "The Ninth Gate" doesn't go after the cheap special effects and instead tries to concentrate on a story, but for goodness sake, make me a little spooked instead of chuckling at every supposed twist and turn that aren't really twists and turns at all. The only wrinkle, and both The Dude on the Left and I finally have a film to prove it, is that, in the end, women are evil, just as we always thought. Trash just couldn’t figure why the devil didn’t let the book collector figure out the puzzle. The I posed the question to her "If you’re the devil, would you want some old geezer conjuring you up, or Johnny Depp?" She then understood.

Gosh, a movie with quality nudity, the potential for a scary story, a couple of cool dead people, and a hot babe (the same who got naked), and I can only give "The Ninth Gate" 1 star out of 5. Yea, I'm supposed to get it that this is a thinking movie about the devil and stuff, rather than going for cheap effects and a blasting soundtrack, but I was in no way entertained, other than the chuckles as everything I figured was going to happen, well, did (like who would have thought Depp could follow a Range Rover through the woods in a Rolls, at least I think it was a Rolls. A Rolls doesn't really handle a shallow river too well - duh!)

That's it for this one! I'm The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!