The Mothman Prophecies

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * * )

Those same beady eyes, the shapeless form, the strange nocturnal habits. Yes, if you squint - and boy, he certainly does - you might see something familiar in Richard Gere's performance in this paranormal thriller.

Yes, he's Mulder. Or he might as well be, given his Duchovny-like limited emotional range and that this allegedly "based on a true story" effort is straight out of X-Files territory. It also tries hard to say something about fate, grief and loss and reaches for the same heart-strings tugged by The Sixth Sense and Signs, while framing it against an encounter with the supernatural.

Except, as we follow Gere's recently widowed Washington newspaper reporter wandering about the West Virginia hinterland trying to figure out why the locals keep reporting a dark winged creature who would seem to be a harbinger of doom, it goes from spooky to kooky all too soon.

And as it runs out of storytelling power halfway through, the movie's question about whether Gere is participating in some community hallucination unfortunately provokes the reaction: Who cares?

It doesn't help that director Pellington (following his intriguing paranoia-thriller Arlington Road) throws every stylistic visual and sound device in his book in the hope of creating a sense of dread. Or that Gere's supporting players - Laura Linney as the local sheriff and Alan Bates as the reluctant paranormal expert - are respectively under- and over-utilised.

And if starring in a Richard Gere horror movie, loosely based on a book about strange incidents in 1967, is supposed to be Linney's reward for her terrific work in the indie You Can Count On Me, well life just isn't fair.

This also feels like it's been hacked about with in the editing suite. A hinted at developing relationship between Gere and Linney seems to have ended up in the bin, while another result is that it hits a very long flat patch on the way to its a-ha finale.

As for the plot, which demands Gere's character - a supposedly sceptical reporter - undergo some alarming jumps in the time-space continuum without being too concerned why ... well, if you're dealing with a mothman, you're just going to get some really big holes, man.

Cast: Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Debra Messing
Director: Mark Pellington

Rating: M (supernatural themes)

Running time: 119 mins

Screening: Village, Hoyts cinemas