I'll Be There with You: 3 out of 10: This movie is a mess. It threatens to become an interesting mess; but alas, it is in reality just a mess.
The first clue something is wrong, is this movie’s supposed genre. Apparently, it is a horror movie. I’ll Be There With You is no more a horror movie than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was. It has horrific elements certainly, but it is more of a drama and a relationship drama at that. Whether director Akihiro Kitamura meant to make a horror film or the marketing department at Celebrity Video Distribution simply choose to label it as a horror film is unknown.
Now what director Kitamura meant by this film is somewhat of a mystery; it is all over the place. There is a relationship drama, bar pick-ups, date rape, non-date rape, strange computer graphics from someone’s Commodore Amiga, escaped criminals killing, Japanese nerd comic relief, and Daniel Baldwin.
Indeed a bloated Daniel Baldwin gives the best performance of the film. That alone should be condemning with faint praise. In fairness, the ladies in the cast (Adarsha Benjamin, Michelle Lawrence and Elisabeth Donaldson) are decent if somewhat unpolished, but the male lead Akihiro Kitamura is a black hole of charisma. Kituamura’s tearful denouement is cinematic pain defined. (I would blame the director but they are the same guy.) With its lack of focus and bizarre computer generated sequels I’ll Be There With You reminds me of that mess Demonlover. But with a lower budget and less talent on both sides of the camera I’ll Be There With You’s mess is even less enjoyable.
There are a couple of good movies in here somewhere. Unfortunately, this is not one of them.
The first clue something is wrong, is this movie’s supposed genre. Apparently, it is a horror movie. I’ll Be There With You is no more a horror movie than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was. It has horrific elements certainly, but it is more of a drama and a relationship drama at that. Whether director Akihiro Kitamura meant to make a horror film or the marketing department at Celebrity Video Distribution simply choose to label it as a horror film is unknown.
Now what director Kitamura meant by this film is somewhat of a mystery; it is all over the place. There is a relationship drama, bar pick-ups, date rape, non-date rape, strange computer graphics from someone’s Commodore Amiga, escaped criminals killing, Japanese nerd comic relief, and Daniel Baldwin.
Indeed a bloated Daniel Baldwin gives the best performance of the film. That alone should be condemning with faint praise. In fairness, the ladies in the cast (Adarsha Benjamin, Michelle Lawrence and Elisabeth Donaldson) are decent if somewhat unpolished, but the male lead Akihiro Kitamura is a black hole of charisma. Kituamura’s tearful denouement is cinematic pain defined. (I would blame the director but they are the same guy.) With its lack of focus and bizarre computer generated sequels I’ll Be There With You reminds me of that mess Demonlover. But with a lower budget and less talent on both sides of the camera I’ll Be There With You’s mess is even less enjoyable.
There are a couple of good movies in here somewhere. Unfortunately, this is not one of them.