Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Marva-nova Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

Jackson Booth-Millard From director Nick Hamm (The Hole), I had seen the leading actor make a little error with Hide and Seek, so I was wondering if this critically unpopular film would be the same. Basically Paul (Greg Kinnear) and Jessie Duncan (X-Men and Ugly Betty's Rebecca Romijn) lose their eight year old son Adam (The Butterfly Effect's Cameron Bright), on the day of his eighth birthday, and they are in serious mourning. While they are making arrangements for a funeral and stuff, they meet genetic scientist Richard Wells (Robert De Niro) who tells them of his extensive stem cell research. He says that he can give them their son back, cloning his DNA and placing it into Jessie's womb to give birth to their son all over again, to look and be exactly the same, and it is successful. They are happy for eight years in their new surroundings (to avoid the law), and then things go wrong on Adam's birthday, the day he died. Slowly subtle differences are appearing in the new Adam, he is suffering severe nightmares and flashbacks that start turning into an alternative personality, Zachary. Jessie is obviously much more connected to the new Adam than maybe Paul, he believes that his son is turning evil and that the authorities should know about the whole affair to get some help, but Richard is very forceful to make sure that this big secret is kept secret. De Niro, Kinnear and Romijn are all alright, the story wasn't completely predictable for me, it was in fact pretty confusing and a little rubbish, a not very convincing or interesting horror thriller, but a bit watchable. Okay!

Michael_Elliott Godsend (2004)* 1/2 (out of 4) Paul Duncan (Greg Kinnear) is at the top of his life with a wonderful job and a family that loves him dearly. His wife Jessie (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) and young son Adam live in a high-class apartment in New York City where Paul works as a teacher at an inner-city school. Everything seems to be going great until the day after Adam's eighth birthday when he is stuck by a car in the street and killed. Paul and Jessie are heartbroken but the day after they run into a scientist (Robert DeNiro) who says he has something important to discuss with them.The scientist explains that he's involved in genetic experimenting and if the parents want to see their son again then he can make that possible by cloning. Without putting too much thought into the grieving parents agree and the experiment goes through without a problem. The first eight years of their new sons life goes off without a hitch but when the date arrives that the first Adam died, this new Adam starts to change mentally. At first it appears this is just due to nightmares but soon the parent begin to fear that this new son is starting to have memories of his previous life. The new Adam on the other hand starts to think that someone from his past is after him. Could it be the old Adam coming back to life? For the past thirty years various films have dealt with children being possessed. Everything from Rosemary's Baby to The Exorcist to The Omen has dealt with the subject matter used here but those films at least tried something different and didn't just recycle stuff seen in previous films. Godsend tries to be exactly like those films and even mixes in a bit of The Shining but in the end we're left with one extremely bad film that doesn't have a single thing going for it, which is a shame since the story could have been a whole lot better.The direction and screenplay really killed any hopes of a good movie. The screenplay has a pretty good ideas going and since cloning is such a hot topic today it seems like you could make an interesting story out of anything but that doesn't happen here. The screenplay is all over the map by the time the film had ended I really wasn't sure what the point was or if there was even a point. The film tries to throw in horror elements mixed with a family drama but neither are given any original thoughts and nothing plays out completely so in the end we've watched a film about nothing. Even after the child is child and the parents get the chance to clone him, there isn't a scene where they think about what could happen by doing this. We get the dad saying no, the mom saying yes and then the screenplay jumps to the child being born.The parents are dumb as a bag of rocks, which is another irritating thing about the screenplay. Not only do they not consider the side effects but they don't seem to even know when things start to take a change for the worst in their new son. When his attitude begins to change, instead of being concerned they simply don't want to know if something is really wrong or not. The film tries to take a more dramatic turn every once in a while by having the parents fight over what they've done but these scenes go nowhere and instead of having a thought provoking conversation the screenplay pretty much jumps over any bright ideas and goes into the next scene, which makes even less sense.The horror elements never go full ahead either, which is probably due to the PG-13 era and the fact we're living in times where it seems you can't make an R-rated film. Perhaps this is a reason why nothing ever comes full circle but I'm really not sure because I still can't tell what this film was supposed to be about. For the first two-thirds we're led to believe that the old son has come back to haunt the new son but then in the final act we're given a new mystery that is just downright stupid and once again, it never pays off in the end. When the movie finally ends you're no better off then when the movie started.Another problem are the actors, a couple of whom should probably stay out of dramatic pictures. Greg Kinnear can be good in comedy but his dramatic work here is so bad it becomes rather laughable. The scene where he tries to cry over the death of his son had me rolling on the floor, which I'm sure wasn't what the director wanted. Rebecca Romijn-Stamos doesn't fair any better with the dramatic role. Just look at any scene where she is crying because it appears there's a quick cut whenever she is supposed to cry. Perhaps they did this because the tears never came? I'm not sure but that's what I thought while watching the film. It saddens me to say this because he's one of my favorite actors but Robert DeNiro doesn't add anything to the film either and it appears he was simply cashing a check.

bob the moo Paul and Jessie Duncan live in a rough part of the city but are happy with their lives and their young son Adam. However tragedy strikes when Adam is killed in a car accident right in front of Jessie, leaving the couple broken and lost. At their lowest point they are met by a former tutor of Jessie's, enigmatic doctor Richard Wells. Infamous for this genetic work, Wells claims that he can use DNA from the dead Adam to essentially produce a clone. With Jessie no longer able to have children, the couple agree to the illegal and experimental procedure (which also involves moving to a big empty house) and the new born is soon with them. All is great until Adam reaches eight years old and suddenly the nightmares starts and Adam's behaviour changes.A few years ago cloning became a hot topic and produced several interesting debates over the moral and ethical issues surrounding it. There were no easy answers and it was/is a topic that is hard to hold a clear view on unless you happen to have it decided for you by your religion. Writer Bomback takes this interesting hotbed of ethical debate and churns out a modern twist on the Omen with few original ideas and nothing of any real interest. The plot just tries to engineer plenty of "creepy" moments with the thinnest of ideas behind them and, as a result I didn't really care that much about any of it. Hamm's solid direction is OK but he can't add much in the way of real chills.Kinnear and Romijn make for an unlikely couple and they don't have a very convincing relationship. Neither of them have much to work with; they do the basics with the script but they can't raise it and don't even suggest that they would produce the sort of emotions you'd expect from a couple seeing their dead son recreated in front of them. Bright is suitably creepy and he does what is asked of him – the rest isn't his fault. De Niro phones in his performance; he isn't terrible but you can't help feel that he is worth more than this and that he surely can't need the money that much.Overall then a roundly poor chiller that offers very little other than unimaginative and unoriginal ideas. Not chilling in the least and it just plods its way towards a pointless and annoying conclusion.

vip_ebriega My Take: Boring rehash that wastes its cast and its audience as well. From a title like "Godsend" or "The Omen" or "The Exorcist", one can't have an idea that the film being presented is a religion-based horror flick. Sadly I say, this isn't. "Godsend" is a science-fiction story about resurrection. The film opens with the birthday celebration of young Adam (Cameron Bright), the son of couple Paul (Greg Kinnear)and Jessie (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) Duncan. The film continues a few days later when Adam becomes victim of a car accident. While Paul and Jessie grieve the death of their son, scientist Richard Wells (Robert DeNiro) approaches them with a message of hope, their son can be brought back to life. After a couple of experiments, they have brought Adam back to life. Pretty soon, this 'new' Adam begins to have nightmares, terrifying revelations of a boy named Zachary (who looks like him) and a burning school. Of course, these are just nightmares, or a trick of the imagination, but can it be real? Oooohhh... The better question is can director Nick Hamm overcome the growing tedium of the script? How many more plot twists and revelations are they gonna keep throwing at us before we all say in unison that we don't get it? Can Robert DeNiro salvage his career in such a career-derailing role? Do I have to tell you where all this is going? Rating: 0 out of 5.