The 9th Life of Louis Drax (DVD) – Movie Review
After our review of The Girl on the Train, based on a bestselling book by Paula Hawkins, we can now present you with our thoughts on an adaptation of another bestselling book, this time by Liz Jensen: The Ninth Life of Louis Drax. Other than the fact that they are both adaptations of a book, the two films don’t have that much incommon, except Oliver Platt playing a psychiatrist in both movies, a role he can handle quite well it seems. This time, we get taken along in a supernatural story about an extraordinary boy, Louis Drax, who almost dies on his ninth birthday, falling off a cliff.
Louis Drax (Aiden Longworth) is a little boy, living with his parents Natalie (Sarah Gadon) and Peter (Aaron Paul). While they seem to be a happy family, Louis regularly seems to have something going on, such as a broken arm or a black eye. Him and his mother always pin it down as him being clumsy, or rather extraordinary, as he seems to always have a guardian angel to protect him, every time something goes wrong. Just like they say cats have nine lives, it seems that Louis has multiple lives, or chances at life. Louis is a smart kid, but as his mother keeps telling him that he is extraordinary, he starts to believe it himself, which makes him quite a cocky little man.
When Louis sets out with his parents to celebrate his ninth birthday with a picnic in the mountains, things go terribly wrong. Louis falls off a cliff, and his father disappears. Natalie calls an ambulance, but it seems Louis didn’t survive this time. To the police she makes a statement saying Peter pushed Louis off the cliff. At the hospital, Louis suddenly wakes up, only to end up in a coma. Dr. Allan Pascal (Jamie Dornan) takes care of Louis now, and even though he knows the odds are small, he still believes that the brain is more than the sum of its parts, and that maybe somehow, Louis will wake up from his coma. In the meantime, he also grows closer to Natalie, feeling sorry for all she’s been through. Things turn strange fast after that, when he starts to receive threatening letters.
The story is completely told from Louis’ point of view. Despite him being in a coma, through the voiceovers you still get a good idea of what is going on in his head, which is quite disturbing, to say the least. While he seems to be motionless, he still has a way of making himself heard. The supernatural elements add a bit more interest to the story, but that’s about it. Other than that, you get the cliché ‘relationship’ between the doctor and Louis’ mother, and every now and then an update on the police investigation into the disappearance of Peter, which won’t make you much wiser.
The acting in this film has its ups and downs. In general, the actors don’t do such a bad job, and Sarah Gadon and Oliver Platt – as Louis’ psychiatrist Dr. Perez – portray their characters quite well. Aaron Paul actually does a great job as Louis’ father who is both loving, as well as mysterious. Jamie Dornan we didn’t like so much, partly because of his acting skills, but maybe also because his character fulfils quite a lot of clichés, which we are just not fond of in a film like this.
This DVD release comes with no extras at all, which is at the same time a relief and a missed opportunity. We didn’t feel much like watching a lot of extras after watching the film, yet on the other hand, some explanation about how certain things were filmed would have been fun. Also, since the film is based on a bestseller, a link to the book would have been appreciated too.
Conclusion
The 9th Life of Louis Drax tells a story that isn’t bad in itself, but gets a bit annoying after a while, we found. The combination of the supernatural and reality has its good moments, but overall we just saw a cocky young boy and his unstable mother whom the doctor seems to be fond of. Also the acting has its good moments, but sadly, not only that. Overall, the movie isn’t that bad, but just not everyone’s cup of tea, and, we found, not very convincing.
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