Tell Tale (2009)
"Tell-Tale" (original title)

A man's newly transplanted heart leads him on a dangerous journey to find out who murdered its donor.

Director:

Michael Cuesta

Writers:

Dave Callaham (screenplay), Edgar Allan Poe (short story "The Tell-Tale Heart")

Stars:

Josh Lucas, Lena Headey, Brian Cox

1 win.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Josh Lucas	...	Terry Bernard
Lena Headey	...	Elizabeth Clemson
Brian Cox	...	Phillip Van Doren
Beatrice Miller	...	Angela Bernard
Jamie Harrold	...	Kevin Stanovich
Michael Kenneth Williams	...	Acherton
Pablo Schreiber	...	Bernard Cochius
Tom Riis Farrell	...	Legethon
Ulrich Thomsen	...	Doctor Lethe
Dallas Roberts	...	The Surgeon
Cassandre Fiering	...	Frances Vieillard
Peg Holzemer	...	Elderly Woman In Wheelchair (as Peg Saurman Holzemer)
Scott Winters	...	Doctor Averman
Kara Lund	...	Nurse
John Timothy Botka	...	Police Officer

Storyline

In Providence, a husband and wife die in a botched robbery; we see flickers of his last memories. His heart goes to Terry Bernard, a single father raising a girl with a rare degenerative disease. After the operation, Terry has flashes of memory from the last moments of the dead donor's life. Then, he recognizes one of the donor's killers and follows him into an alley. Within days, Terry becomes an unwilling avenger, with a police detective on his trail. Meanwhile, he begins a romance with his daughter's doctor, his moods complicated by memory flashes, the donor's deepening presence in both Terry's mind and body, and the unexplained bond among the donor's killers. Can this end well?

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Plot Keywords:

donor | police detective | gore | memory loss | radiologist | 

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Taglines:

The pieces are coming together. His life is falling apart.

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Genres:

Drama | Horror | Sci-Fi | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for violent content, language and a scene of sexuality

Details

Official Sites:

Official site [fr]

Country:

UK USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

31 December 2009 (Greece)

Also Known As:

Tell Tale

Filming Locations:

Benefit Street, Providence, Rhode Island, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$12,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Artina Films, Oceana Media Finance, Poe Boy Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

93 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color (FotoKem)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Goofs

When lead character meets Acherton in bathroom his name-tag says Michael Acherton after he is called the detective refers to him as Paul Acherton.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Paramedic: [over radio] Dispatch this is Rescue 3. I have a 55 year old white male named Lyar, John. He has massive blunt trauma to the skull. Glasgow Coma Score is 1, Henry 3. Patient has ID in his wallet identifying him as an organ donor. Alert trauma and transport team.
Dispatcher: Copy that.

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Soundtracks

"The Torture"
Written by Leslie Stevens
Performed by Leslie and the Badgers

User Reviews

Unsatisfactory and tedious

Even though it pretends to be a free adaptation of the classic short story The Tell-Tale Heart, written by the great Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), the film Tell-Tale is in fact a rehash of the old sub-genus of "malignant part of the body", which includes horror movies such as The Hand, Body Parts and The Eye. Those films showed how an organ transplanted from one body to the other can produce unexpected effects, usually with tragic consequences to the patient (or victim) of the procedure. And even though Tell-Tale has a few positive elements, its tedious narrative and bland drama ended up producing a boring and unsatisfactory film experience.

There are two predictable twists in Tell-Tale: the first one is revealed pretty soon, and the other one, at the ending. And besides of that, this film is basically a collection of long and uninteresting scenes in which we see the main character afflicted by events he does not understand; the treatment for his daughter's illness; and the insipid romance he was with a doctor. And the worst thing of all is that none of those elements substantially contribute to the story, and they feel as simple fillers so that the time goes through while there are not murder scenes.

Tell-Tale includes elements from a medical drama, a thriller and a horror film which deals with supernatural subjects...however, there is not an adequate cohesion between them. On the positive side, Josh Lucas, Lena Headey, Brian Cox and Beatrice Miller bring solid performances despite having such poor material to work with. So, in conclusion, I cannot recommend Tell-Tale, because I found it to be a very boring movie which lacks of any emotion, impact or suspense.