THE KOVAK BOX (DVD Review) - 7/1/08

Forget the misleading cover design and blurb on the back-cover that makes this out to be some Matrix type nonsense or even the author being the hero of his own story. A strangely curious mix of English/Spanish co-production we get Timothy Hutton with David Kelly and even Annette Badland ending up in a strange scenario that could have been written by Stephen King so alike to his work that this piece is. I checked the credits and it wasn't him it was actually written and directed by Daniel Monzon. But the creation of a world that takes on a life of a novelists work is definitely up King's street. More than that it starts off strange with credits at the beginning that have a mouse running through a maze that becomes an integral plot point later on. David Kelly adroitly comes across as a rather sinister figure juggling the puppets behind the scenes and the ending in the lighthouse made me jump so unexpected as it was. In an odd sense the novelist's work coming to life is a bit of a red herring as something more despicable is actually happening to serve a single person's greed. A low-budget independent film that has a creepy atmosphere to itself and certainly worth giving a spin. The "Making Of" Featurette is also pretty handy in fleshing out more of the background to the film.

David Norton (Timothy Hutton) get's asked to a writer's convention on a small island out in the Mediterranean. Trying to work on his latest novel he get's drawn into a series of events that are not only inexplicable to him but seem to cause various suicide attempts to people around him. As he investigates further he get's pulled into a sequence of events that he and his companion will struggle to get out of alive.