One Hour Photo

Released 2002
Stars Robin Williams, Connie Nielsen, Michael Vartan, Dylan Smith, Erin Daniels, Gary Cole 
Directed by Mark Romanek

Robin Williams lets his darker side out to play in this taut psychological thriller about Sy Parrish (Williams), an unbalanced photo clerk who becomes obsessed with a picture-perfect suburban family. Sy has watched Nina (Connie Nielsen) and Will Yorkin (Michael Vartan) celebrate happy occasions through their snapshots for years; when the flawless façade he's created for himself starts to crumble, he takes matters into his own hands.

Summary from http://www.netflix.com

SPOILER ALERT: The movie opens in a police interrogation room with Sy being questioned about an unspecified horrible crime against Will Yorkin, and then it shifts to the beginning of the story. I'm getting tired of this device, and it almost ruined the movie for me because it robbed the story of its tension. First-time director Mark Romanek does an excellent job of digging us deeper into Sy's creepy world, but he told us how far Sy was going to go right off the bat. The purpose of a thriller like this is to make you fearful of how far the protagonist will go, so what's the point in telling you in the beginning? We don't know the exact crime, but we know it's severe. The cool thing is it isn't anything standard, but I would have liked to have let it come in natural order. Other than that, I enjoyed this flick. It has sumptuous visuals (it's like being in a photo processor) and an amazing performance from Robin Williams. The rest of the performances range from adequate to weak, but Robin carries the entire film by himself. It was fun to watch the behind the scenes featurette on the DVD that shows him being his manic self between takes but instantly switching to the emotionally neutered Sy. Honestly, I don't know how he does it.

Until the ending, I was disappointed the movie didn't let us inside Sy's head. We saw his behavior, but we didn't know his motivation. In the end, Robin is given an actor's dream scene where he's able to give an emotional soliloquy that is surprisingly subtle and moving. It ties the entire film together in one of those moments where everything instantly becomes crystal clear, and it elevates the entire film. If the intro had been removed, this would have been in my top 10 for the year. --Bill Alward, February 19, 2003