NateManD "the Passion of Darkly Noon" has to be one of the most bleak and emotional films I have seen. It's even more depressing than Philip Ridley's other film, "The Reflecting Skin". Believe it or not, Philip Ridley is not only a writer of plays but of children's books. "The Passion of Darkly Noon" is a beautiful, disturbing and surreal psychological drama in the vein of "Blue Velvet", "Santa Sangre", "Donnie Darko" and "I Stand Alone". Brandon Fraiser gives an amazing and overlooked performance as Darkly Noon; a naive young Christian man who's just escaped a waco like religious cult. He witnessed his parents and other members shot down by police. Darkly is found injured in the woods and stays with Callie (Ashley Judd), who takes care of Darkly till he's better. Ashley Judd's Character is a nature loving feminist beauty. (Check out the close up of her arm pit hair.) Callie start's to fall for Darkly. Her mute boyfriend is played by Viggo Mortenson. Since Darkly has lived a secluded life with not much contact of the outside world, he doesn't know how to deal with his sexual feelings for Callie. Out of guilt he prays for forgiveness and mutilates himself with barb wire. His religious beliefs cause him to slowly loose his sanity and see visions of his dead parents. He feels it's God's mission for him to kill. The film builds up unbearable tension as it goes along. Ashley Judd is amazing with a performance so good, it's as if she's having a real nervous breakdown. Brandon Fraiser gives the best performance of his career. His character is down right scary, especially compared to his usual roles in family films. Their are certain images in this film that are very confusing. One being the giant silver shoe floating in the pond. "The Passion of Darkly Noon" is somewhat of a puzzle and may require a second viewing. Either way it has my highest recommendation.

Patrick Farley Brendan Fraser plays the role of a man who has lived under the severe guidance of hyper-religious parents. We slowly get to see him degenerate from a stiff, proper, 'perfect' Christian to a lustful, sexual being, and then into a person who has lost touch with reality completely.The object of his passion is Callie. She tempts him, almost tauntingly, but at the same time obliviously. Her boyfriend, Clay, is played by Viggo Mortensen, in what I suspect is his only NON speaking role.Viggo plays the role of a mute convincingly, showing us another dimension of talent. He uses body language, exaggerated gestures common to the mute, facial expressions, and a couple vocalisations in form of whistles and clicks, or rapping on an object. The vocalisations serve both as attention getters and exclamations to make a point.At the end, after a fight with Darkly (Lee), Viggo's facial expression is the most menacing I have ever seen--and that includes his role in the recent 'History of Violence' Lee meets up with Roxy, part way through. We find out that she is Clay's mum, and holds a grudge against Callie, claiming she is a witch who ruined her family when she was brought into the household much the same way Lee was--an injured stranger.Roxy is so convincing that I honestly expected to find out that Callie truly was a witch (in fact, I'm still not convinced that she ISN'T). Roxy's opinions don't help Lee's sanity any, and in the end, after a discussion with his dead parents, he totally loses it, and sets off to destroy the witch.I was honestly confused by the ending, and am going to have to re-watch it to see if I get it again.In regards to technical aspects-the music was perfectly selected and placed. There were a few instances where the camera used jerky, quick shots, changing angles or scenes (cutting back and forth from Lee to Callie or Clay, e.g.). It was perfectly done-other producers have tried those shots, but I usually end up feeling physically ill from the quick changes. These were just breathtaking.

maatmouse It is rare to chance on the first few films of a Hollywood actor obviously destined for better stuff and this is no exception. This is Brendan Fraser post California/Encino man and pre-Mummy etc in a sexy movie about passions bubbling under the surface. Fraser plays the Darkly Noon of the title who is found by a labourer and taken to his friends, Caly and Clay who reside in the forest. For the first 30 minutes plus of the film, only Caly is present, a beautiful and at times teasing presence in the film from Noon's perspective. Extremely religious Noon has difficulty reconciling Caly and his feelings for her until her lover, Clay returns and, troubled by their love for each other and the teachings of his parents and other strangers in the woods, Noon fights, literally against his rescuers quite spectacularly.

um5 'The passion of Darkly Noon' is probably one of the worst movies I have ever watched. The reason why I stayed with it till the end was that I was curious how many more unreasonable, incoherent and irrelevant features were about to appear. This is not discrediting the actors, I leave that open, but only about the storyline.The plot is very simple and easy to guess after the first few minutes but then the movie keeps changing subject and focus. First, it is obviously the issue of Noon and Callie and that she is his first love after being brought up in a very isolated context. Then the movie shifts to the story between Callie and Roxy suggesting to become more of a mysterious thriller about witchcraft, but this is just a fake and does not go far. The appearance of Noon's parents adds to the issue but seemed to me completely ridiculous, furthered by the awful acting of both of them (and who did that make-up?). Towards the end the movie goes into longer and longer scenes. The climax (from the point where Noon starts painting himself in the cave until he is killed) could have been just as well expressed in half the time, the scenes drag on for ages. few more things. First, the undertaker. Who wrote this character into the movie? He is a joke and does not fit at all with the overall pace and depth the movie desperately but unsuccessfully tries to establish. His little helper (who finds Darkly Noon in the first place) speaks of Darkly as his friend, although they have only seen each other once or twice. The friendship was probably so emphasized in order to make the final shooting scene a hard decision for that guy (seeing that he has to kill his 'friend'). But the conflict does not appear at all in that scene (he quickly shoots Darkly and that's it).Last thing. What is the silver shoe all about? Was that to include some symbolic feature? Anything would have been more believable than a giant silver shoe floating down a river because a circus-family had an accident loosing that shoe on that river. How come the shoe floats past Darkly but is later used as a burning stake for Roxy's dog (would you incinerate your dog on a silver shoe? was it completely normal for Roxy to find a giant silver shoe? shouldn't the shoe have been much further downstream by the point it is used?). The circus family, who appears randomly in the last scene of the movie, did not only have one giant silver shoe, no, they also had a miniature model of it (which the son's 'favourite toy'). First of all, who believes that!? Second, his son's 'favourite toy'? Any stick is a better toy than a silver shoe (which will always remain a silver shoe, any wooden stick would be more interesting (because it would trigger the imagination) than an abstract silver shoe. By the way, Callie never saw the silver shoe before, so when it is presented to her it cannot have any meaning to her (and how helpful is a silver shoe after your house burned down!?)These were my major concern, rendering this movie completely ridiculous and horribly written.