Upcomingmovies.com says that The Gift will expand to 74 select cities on January 19th. What cities those are, I have no idea. More reviews.. ShowBIZ Haley Joel Osment isn't the only person who sees dead people. In The Gift, Cate Blanchett plays Annie Wilson, a psychic Southern woman visited by the restless spirit of a murder victim. At its best, this film is a spooky, character-driven thriller with a superb performance by Blanchett. Unfortunately, the casting of too many familiar faces sometimes gets in the way of the story, which lacks a completely original punch. Despite the lack of originality, The Gift gets its energy from its heroine, a strong, almost noble young woman, who denies the pain she feels every day. Annie's pain comes from the loss of her husband to an explosion at the factory where he worked. Ever since, she and her sons have been struggling with dad's absence; Annie's answer to the emptiness is to simply pretend that everything is okay. Besides, she barely has time to deal with her own problems, forced as she is to "read" the future for all the locals in order to support her family. Read the rest of the review --------------------------------------------- iF magazine THE GIFT is likely to suffer from comparisons to recent supernatural thrillers like WHAT LIES BENEATH and THE SIXTH SENSE. While it shares some elements with those and other films, a viewer should look at THE GIFT as a fascinating exploration of a storytelling archetype that can coexist with other filmmakers' interpretations. THE GIFT does follow through where most other movies cop out. Most movies lead up to a discovery and that's it. Well, THE GIFT goes beyond the discovery to create a complicated mystery that plays out through its protagonist's psychic visions. Read the rest of the review --------------------------------------------- Film Journal Those gosh-darn Hollywood folk are at it again, wallowing in the white-trash melodrama of The Gift like pigs in a pit full of truffles. What is it about lower-class Southerners that attracts actors of the caliber of Cate Blanchett, Giovanni Ribisi and Oscar-winner Hilary Swank? Must be the thick accents, the coarse attitudes, the big hairdos, the tacky outfits—the chance to embody a living cartoon after the emotional demands of an Elizabeth or a Boys Don’t Cry. The Gift wants to believe it’s also a sensitive tale of small-town outcasts, but deep down, it’s an overwrought, cornpone, Southern-gothic “Twilight Zone” padded to feature length. Read the rest of the review --------------------------------------------- AICN I’m glad we got one of the movies on my list out of the way at the Butt-Numb-A-Thon, actually, and I’ve spent the last few weeks mulling over Sam Raimi’s groovy new thriller THE GIFT. I was surprised how mixed the reaction was at the Alamo after this one screened. Personally, I had a great time with it, and it’s grown on me as I’ve thought it over. It’s everything I wanted from this summer’s WHAT LIES BENEATH, with a sly, simple script by Billy Bob Thornton and Tom Epperson, whose previous collaborations (A FAMILY THING and ONE FALSE MOVE) have both been smart and solid, if not spectacular. Read the rest of the review

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