THE TRUTH ABOUT CHARLIE. Universal Pictures, 2002. Thandie Newton, Mark Wahlberg, Tim Robbins, Christine Boisson, Simon Abkarian, Charles Aznavour. Based on the film Charade (1963). Director and co-screenwriter: Jonathan Demme.

   There was a lot of talent involved in making this movie, but the end result certainly doesn’t show it. I came across this film by researching the credits of the leading female star, Thandie Newton, whom I most recently saw in the mini-series Rogue, which I recently reviewed here.

   She has the second-most undesirable task of playing the part that Audrey Hepburn played in the movie this one is a remake of, and I’m happy to saw that she does a creditable job of imitating the pixieish charm of Miss Hepburn. On a scale from one to a hundred, I’d give her a 60. Mark Wahlberg, however, displays — well, let’s put it this way. Cary Grant had more charm in the pinkie of his left hand than Mark Wahlberg shows in trying to follow in his predecessor’s most considerable footsteps.

   I know Wahlberg has gone on to bigger and better things, but at this stage of his career, he was out of his league. And Tim Robbins in Walter Matthau’s shoes? Not on your life, not ever.

   The story’s almost the same. A young woman who’s not been married long but is already thinking divorce comes home from a brief vacation to find the apartment they share all but empty and what furniture there still is destroyed. Turns out the man is dead, he had many many secrets, and many people want something — a fortune in diamonds that he had in his possession.

   All of the fancy camera doesn’t help a muddled and badly told story, and it often served to make me dizzy. This was a mess, through and through — there’s no better word to describe it — a film best avoided if possible, and I don’t say that lightly. The only reason I watched until the bitter end was to see Thandie Newton, whose name and fame does not match that of any of the others involved in this production, but it should.

PS. There is still the same fatal flaw in the plot that the first movie had, and if anyone wants to know, I’ll bring it up in the comments. That’s the one thing they could have improved upon in putting this remake together, and why they didn’t, I can’t possibly imagine.