The Moth Diaries (2011)
Continuing my short break from Westerns, I explored another of Sarah Bolger's movies. Looking at her IMDb page, I noticed quite a range of movie from terrible to half decent, and a range of roles from lead, supporting, and minor, both in movies and TV series, but there was nothing that looked particularly spectacular. There are a few more of her movies I'm interested in checking out.
Emelie looks like a superficial and cliche, but entertaining, thriller. And two that look like fairly decent romantic dramas,
As Cool as I Am and
Kiss Me. This movie,
The Moth Diaries, was a bit of a cliche, superficial, entertaining thriller. I mildly enjoyed it, but nothing really excited me, and there were some dull moments. The dialogue never discussed anything deep or meaningful, though the subject matter of suicide, loss, loneliness, depression, anxiety, delusion, jealousy, poetry, Gothic literature, and vampires, had more than enough potential. Sadly that potential felt squandered and the movie settled for merely scratching at the surface. The plot followed Bolger's character, Rebecca, who was presumably 16 although the actress was 19 or 20. This was one of those movies about a bunch of 20-somethings pretending to be high-school students. Personally, I just imagined it was a college or university. So, the story was about this girl, Rebecca, who returned to boarding school after the summer break to be reunited with her best friend, Lucie, only to find that a mysterious new girl was stealing her friend from her. Exploring themes of vampirism, Rebecca began to suspect the new girl, Ernessa, of somehow being corrupt, but struggled to accept the supernatural due to her naturalistic world-view. This internal conflict about the naturalistic view and the supernatural was a turmoil inside of Rebecca, and served as a central plot theme. Ernessa was played by Lily Cole, and Lucie was played by Sarah Gadon. Scott Speedman, notably from the Underworld franchise, made an appearance as Mr. Davies a new male teacher in this all-girl's school. He played the role of little more than a sex object. Overall, while I did find the movie lacking in substance, it was mildly entertaining. I wouldn't really recommend this movie unless you're interested in Sarah Bolger, and then I wouldn't raise your expectations any higher than "mildly entertaining." There was only one scene where the acting actually impressed me, and that was a flashback where Bolger's character found her father dead in the bathtub with his wrists slit. The expression of sorrow mixed with horror while she was screaming was done beautifully.