Wander

This is a movie that should be better than it is. The actors are fine, the storytelling and editing are suspect. Also some of the dialog is very difficult to understand, requiring subtitles turned on at times we wanted to be sure of what was discussed. It takes place in the fictional New Mexico town of Wander where everyone knows everyone else and strangers in town are stopped and warned. A paranoid detective, deep into conspiracy theories, is hired to investigate the real cause of a death, a woman found in the middle of the road with a deep wound in her chest near her heart. The editing is jumpy and somewhat erratic, you are often not sure what you are seeing and if it is present or flashback, or even imagined by the paranoid detective. I enjoyed the viewing at some level but don't consider it a particularly good movie. The writer and director, a team of sorts, have limited experience with movies and it shows. My wife and I watched it at home on DVD from our public library.

One day in the far distant future mankind will uncover all the secrets of the universe. The last thing uncovered will be what the heck this movie's about.

It can't be a coincidence that the two 'Two-Face' actors get together to do a film and Aaron Eckhart decides to do a 'Batman' voice for the role, can it? His voice is incredibly husky in this film. Just a thought that crossed my mind. 'Wander' was a bizarre little film. There's a lot going on here, and it might just have been a little much for the filmmakers to juggle coherently. It was hard to follow, which is fine as long as the film is interesting enough for the audience to justify putting in the leg-work to work it out. On this occasion it was not.

The film commits the cardinal sin of having exactly zero likeable characters. It makes for an extremely unpleasant viewing experience. The sad thing is the cast was more than good enough for this to not have to be the case. Tommy Lee Jones is probably the closest thing we have to someone who could bring a smile to our face, but we don't know his motives, and he's not in the film a whole lot. Eckhart's character is supposed to be the protagonist, however he is a conspiracy nut who may or may not be losing his mind. He's pretty hard work.

There's a very shaky camera present constantly throughout the film. I'm not sure why this was the case but it was very distracting (and I don't typically notice camera-work). I think the idea behind 'Wander' was actually a noble one, and if executed correctly it could have been a very interesting little film. As it is though this would be a hard one to recommend to people.

Ex Cop and now a private investigator Arthur Bretnik (Aaron Eckhart) investigates a current murder in the town of Wander, where a young girl was murdered and Arthur is convinced her death is connected with his daughter's death in a similar car accident years ago. Keep in mind that Arthur suffers from PTSD and mixes his meds and this causes him to be hyper and may have hallucinations. Arthur is paranoid about everything and takes unusual precautions in everything he does. His wing man is Jimmy (Tommy Lee Jones) and both do podcasts that talk about Alien conspiracies.

This is one of the most confusing movies I have ever watched. We are not really sure what this movie is about. Arthur is convinced that someone is kidnapping people for human experiments, but Arthur isn't sure who is involved with that. He keeps seeing a blonde lady in black who he thinks is involved. He learns her name is Elsa (Catheryn Winnick, from the Viking TV Series). She is a very good actress and very beautiful. (I was waiting for you to say that. Very good.)

So enjoy what you can. And if you figure out what this movie is really about, let me know. I have suspicions having to do with Arthur's medical condition and maybe some truth to everything he sees.

Can we rely on what we are being told and what is shown to us? You decide.

Notables: A very pretty Heather Graham as Shelly, Arthur's confidant and lawyer who takes care of Tanya, Arthur's wife who survived the car accident years ago, but is catatonic; Say what?; Raymond Cruz as Sheriff Santiago; Victor, who Arthur meets and believes Victor is the boss and is responsible for human experimentations and kidnappings and everything Arthur has experienced since the accident years ago. (I cannot find who plays Victor, but while searching this out I did see that there were 30 producers of this movie. One of them - you would think - would have said, "Hey this is confusing." Didn't happen.

There is a twist that tries to explain to Arthur that what he saw was not really what he saw. You decide.

Oh, some scenes at the end show a young girl who looks like his daughter only somewhat older. Is his daughter still alive? Her name is/was Zoe (Elizabeth Selby). See? Confusing.

This is watchable, just very confusing; again, you decide. (5/10)

Violence: Yes. Sex: No. Nudity: No. Humor: No. Language: No Rating: C

The story is very confusing and tried to be too clever. The events weren't explained so well, and there are numerous twists. I don't actually know what really happened.