Format: IFC on rockin’ flatscreen.
I’m not necessarily one to judge someone else’s idea of a horror movie, but The Ninth Gate is not an easy fit into the genre. I suppose, since the film deals overtly with Satan, that there is a horror element to it, but this is much more of a suspense and mystery film than anything else. The elements of the supernatural that pop up really only happen once or twice in the middle and then a bit more heavily at the end despite all of the Lucifer this and Lucifer that through the running time. Still, it’s shown up on one of my horror lists, and I am, as ever, a slave to the lists.
Along those same lines, it’s worth saying that Roman Polanski makes interesting horror movies, or movies that at least contain some horror elements. The Ninth Gate fits in nicely with that crop of pseudo-horror films in his filmography. This is a movie that goes more for unsettling and mildly creepy rather than outright scares. Polanski is good at that, and I like The Ninth Gate probably a little more than it warrants.
