Circle Cross Wavy Line Triangle

The Gift (2000) isn’t really a ghost movie - more of a supernatural thriller. I think Netflix recommended it, and since it was directed by Sam Raimi, it made sense. But it was Cate Blanchett that really sold it.

Blanchett plays a small-town fortune teller, who works with ESP cards - circle, square, wavy line, triangle. She does a reading for the battered wife (Hilary Swank) of a local bully, telling her that he’s just a mean redneck, and wouldn’t really kill anyone. She also does a reading for Giovanni Ribisi, a mechanic who hears voices telling him to do terrible things.

Then Swank’s husband show up in his big pick-up to tell Blanchett to stop seeing Swank. He’s played by Keanu Reeves, so he’s pretty threatening, especially when he threatens her kid. But not too threatening, because he’s Keanu.

But someone has gone missing. Greg Kinnear comes to ask her help in finding his fiancé, Katie Holmes. Now, Blanchett has seen Holmes in action, and knows she’s fooling around on Kinnear. And also, Kinnear and Blanchett seem to be getting attached.

Blanchett has a vision of Holmes floating in the air, and thinks she might be in a pond (of which there are many in this swampy Georgia town). She tells sheriff J.K. Simmons, and he drags Reeve’s pond, and finds the body. So Reeves goes to jail for murder - he confesses to sleeping with her, and knocking around his wife, but swears he didn’t kill anyone.

Then Blanchett gets a vision saying he didn’t do it. Since the DA was also sleeping with Holmes, he isn’t interested in re-opening the case. So she will need the help of Simmons and Kinnear, and maybe even psycho Ribisi - although he is in the funny farm upstate.

It’s sort of surprising, given the great cast with Sam Raimi directing, that this is such an ordinary movie. It has it’s share of tension and even madness, and some great acting (Ribisi more than anyone, I’d say), but not really out of the ordinary. But Cate Blanchett elevates it above just fine to great, just through the special effect of her face. What cheekbones!