Sleuth (2007)

The new version of "Sleuth" has one thing going for it right out of the box: a witty, but simple, character-driven story of pure actor one-upmanship derived from the early-1970s classic film inspired by a play.
The story: A cuckolded husband (Michael Caine) dishes psychological torture on the man (Jude Law) sleeping with his wife. Then tables are turned. Then turned again. Caine, it should be noted, played the young man in the 1972 film, so that's also a huge plus. But this update sinks fast. Not because of the can-you-top-this actors, nor Harold Pinter's more nasty screenplay, but because director Kenneth Branagh constantly gets in the way of the story. His camera hangs from ceilings and fireplaces, it lurks behind window blinds, watches the actors through a television screen, sits still as actors walk off, stares at a nostril or eyeball for whole minutes. It plays like a hyperactive film student's thesis project. In essence, Branagh is trying to one-up his own actors as the true artist (Caine plays a writer/Law a would-be actor). The crap lighting and the gaudy art direction also compete as deadly distractions. Thankfully, it's short -- just under 90 minutes. C