GusF Based on the 1970 play of the same name by Anthony Shaffer and adapted for the screen by Harold Pinter, this is a decent but not great film. In spite of the excellent performances of Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine, I was not exactly enamoured of the 1972 version so my hopes were not too high when it came to this one. It was on about the same level that I expected it to be. It is very well directed by Kenneth Branagh - whom I was lucky enough to see play Leontes in "The Winter's Tale" at the Garrick Theatre last week, incidentally - and there are many wonderful shots but the script by Pinter is not great. In some respects, I preferred it to the 1972 version and in others I preferred the 1972 version. However, I don't think that either version is as clever or psychologically interesting as it thinks it is. In both cases, the first 20 to 25 minutes are the strongest. If this film had not been directed by Branagh, I would probably not have bothered watching it, to be honest.Succeeding Olivier in the role of the manipulative Andrew Wyke, Caine gives a great performance but Law's performance in Caine's original role of Milo Tindle is a bit lacking. It's not a bad one by any means. He just goes a bit too far over the top in some respects. Considering that Law previously played the title character in the 2004 remake of Caine's 1966 film "Alfie", he is making a career out of succeeding him in roles. They should have cast him in the remakes of "Get Carter" and "The Italian Job"! In all seriousness, I liked the fact that the silly and distracting thing with the clown costume was removed. However, the homosexual themes were far more interesting when they were kept comparatively subtle in the first half as opposed to the unambiguous attempt at seduction in the second half. The exclusion of the Tea subplot was a mistake and this version's ending is weaker as a result. Oh, and it would have been nice if the underrated Alec Cawthorne had reprised his role as Inspector Doppler, called Inspector Block in this version, as was originally intended but he was unavailable. The cameos by Branagh and Pinter were nice though.Overall, there's nothing terribly wrong with the film but it is fairly bland and boring. The original was far too long at 138 minutes but this one still drags at 88 minutes. In both cases, the concept is far more effective than the execution, which is a shame.

David Holt (rawiri42) A thoroughly enjoyable movie. As usual, Michael Caine clearly demonstrates his worthiness of his knighthood (not to mention nomination - sadly unsuccessful - for this part for the leading actor Oscar).However, much has already been written on IMDb about this excellent movie so I won't waste additional space by simply repeating it all again. My reason for this posting is to ask the question that is its title - Did anyone else notice... the mystic script in the flames? Let me explain. Whilst watching the DVD, I was interrupted by a telephone call and so I paused the film. As it happened, this occurred just as Michael Caine was walking past the gas heater-cum- decoration in his hi-tech home. When I returned to restart the film, I was immediately amazed to see that the flames, when frozen in stop- motion, appeared to spell out words. Had I not paused the film, I doubt very much whether I would have ever noticed this phenomenon. The words "Animation" and either "sublimation" or "substitution" seem to appear and disappear as the film is advanced frame-by-frame. Other words come and go and, whilst discernible, don't appear to spell out a specific sentence or phrase. Since first noticing this, I have examined each frame and am now left wondering if this is nothing more than a freak of nature or was it purposely digitally placed there by Kenneth Branagh and, if so, why... OR... am I hallucinating???The really weird thing is that, even though I have examined the film frame-by-frame, the message that I saw when returning from the phone hasn't been nearly as clear as it was then. This is spooky! So, I return to my original question, has anyone else noticed this and, if they have, can they explain it or, at least, throw more light on it? Someone PLEASE comment.

Wizard-8 I remember liking the original 1970s "Sleuth" movie when it first came out, so I was interested to see what a modern update would be like, especially since Michael Caine would not only be returning, but playing the senior character this time around. Unfortunately, I thought this update was a big disappointment. For starters, the updated setting of the action is now a high tech environment, which feels absolutely cold and passionless, dragging the movie down to a depressing level. And while I can understand why they changed the last third of the story - you have to expect some major changes in a remake - I thought the new plotting in this last third was pretty silly. Michael Caine and Jude Law do give it their all, and their chemistry does on occasion distract you from the movie's shortcomings. But their characters are more mean-spirited than playfully devious, and that often leaves a bad taste. Track down a copy of the original movie instead.

Cayo Hern I hate when a poorly made new and unnecessary film re-make pushes a superior original into the shadows. The Olivier original is in the Amazon Top 250 Films of All-Time....and yet try to find a copy of it on DVD AT A REASONABLE PRICE. Hopefully, someone will at Amazon will realize that the DVD isn't priced correctly and then the demand will result in a re-release of this DVD! How do we get Amazon to revise their prices? I see this happens sometimes with books on Amazon, but this is the first DVD I've wanted that's been affected by these computer glitches. Is there a CONTACT AMAZON or a complaint center we can refer this to? Please advise them if you know how...Until then, I'll just be patiently waiting for the price to come down on the DVDs of the original version.