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Britt Robertson (left) and Kelly Preston in "The Tenth Circle." (CHRIS REARDON/LIFETIME TELEVISION) |
Television Review
A big mystery in a small town
Sometimes a story line twists so much it cracks in one or two places. The Lifetime movie "The Tenth Circle" contorts itself into dust. This adaptation of Jodi Picoult's 2006 novel starts out as an interesting psychological query into a teen girl's alleged rape and evolves into a small-town mystery with a preposterous new plot development at every juncture. Eyes, prepare to roll.
Rather than giving us one or two major revelations in the course of the drama, tonight at 9, "The Tenth Circle" just keeps lurching from surprise to surprise. Every other scene seems to contain a new disclosure - about the teen, Trixie Stone, about her adulterous mother, about her father's legal history - until they all cancel out one another's power. By the end of the movie, a whole lot has happened to the Stone family, there have been many unlikely coincidences afoot, and the truth about the rape has been obvious, then hidden, then obvious again. But still, you may want to shrug your shoulders.
It might have been enough for "The Tenth Circle" to focus in more closely on Trixie (Britt Robertson), a highly strung kid who is devastated when her boyfriend, Jason (Jamie Johnston), breaks up with her for another girl. Later, Trixie and Jason have an encounter at a party, which culminates in Trixie's accusation of rape. What actually happened is unclear. Is Trixie acting out vengeance and desperation by accusing Jason? Is Jason meaner than he looks? Their high school friends take sides, and switch sides, and the truth becomes further obscured.
But the movie - named in reference to Dante's nine circles of hell in "The Divine Comedy" - expands into the story of Trixie's parents' troubled marriage, and in the process it loses its center. College professor Laura (Kelly Preston) is having an affair with a student, while graphic artist Daniel (Ron Eldard) has lost his passion to suburban contentment. They are both unsympathetic characters, particularly Laura, who is played vacantly by Preston, as if she'd prefer to be somewhere else. Eldard, on the other hand, emotes like crazy, and yet his character remains inscrutable and half-baked. Thanks to an odd hairstyle, he also looks like an American Gerard Depardieu.
"The Tenth Circle" isn't exactly tedious; there's too much going on for boredom. But like a person who shares too much information with you, and yet somehow remains distant, the movie doesn't add up to much. Ultimately, it lacks impact.
Matthew Gilbert can be reached at gilbert@globe.com.
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