As a fan of the intellectual and psychological thriller/drama (eg, Se7en, Pi, Magnolia) I had high hopes for this movie. The opening credits succeeded in drawing me in, with a number of “coincidences” being stated as fact, all making connections to the number 23.

I really thought this was going to be a great movie. In fact, the story started out with pretty good potential. Unfortunately, this movie suffers from the same telegraphing symptoms of other high-budget let-downs, like the DaVinci Code, or Secret Window. Every twist is seen coming far in advance, and the plot is paper thin. It’s a story about a story.

I think it’s a sign of a weak writer when you write a story about a story, making that sub-story out to be great. It’s as if the writer imagines his story as great, but knows it’s not, so he has to write a story around it to cast it in a better light. Well, that’s how it looks to me, anyway.