'Birth' dead on arrival

By Jack Garner
Gannett News Service

BIRTH (R) One Star (Poor) A strange, preposterous tale of a 10-year-old boy who shows up and announces to a widow that he's her husband who died 10 years ago. Nicole Kidman stars for director Jonathan Glazer in this major miscue. Fine Line, 100 minutes.

Nicole Kidman is Anna, who's been a widow for 10 years. She's about to be married, though you sense even now it's hard for her; she still feels a great attachment to her deceased spouse, Sean. At a party announcing her engagement to Joseph (Danny Huston), a 10-year-old boy appears and announces to Anna that he's Sean, her husband.

Sure, there's skepticism, but not nearly enough; soon more people than you could imagine begin to think this can somehow be true. This is a film in which no one in the rather large ensemble acts logically. No one.

The screenwriters don't help, because they never satisfactorily explain anything. At first, cloning or reincarnation seems at play, but then again, maybe not. And then a con game seems to be in the works. But I guess not. What the heck?

We could possibly buy "Birth" as a bizarre romantic fable, in the tradition of "Somewhere in Time," if we ever perceived a modicum of romance. But young Sean (Cameron Bright) is a gloomy, mean-spirited cuss, more like "The Omen" than a loving husband. If he loves Anna so much, why is he tormenting her?

I'm sorry, but this movie just doesn't make sense or connect emotionally; I can only assume Kidman and co-stars Huston, Lauren Bacall, Anne Heche and the others got involved because director Jonathan Glazer, previously made the wonderful "Sexy Beast," with Oscar nominee Ben Kingsley as a snarling gangster. Glazer is one for two.

Rated R, with nudity, sex, violence, adult issues.