Review: ‘Dragonfly’ proves a lifeless effort

Geoff Carter

Friday, Feb. 22, 2002 | 9:08 a.m.

"Dragonfly" is, at best, a half-baked descendent of "The Sixth Sense." We can almost see dead people, but not quite; it's almost as if they're embarrassed to be seen in this lifeless hulk. Say what you will about the dead, but they know one of their own.

Kevin Costner plays Joe Darrow, an emergency-room doctor whose crusading wife Emily (Susanna Thompson) dies in a bus accident in Venezuela before the opening credits finish. Her death renders him numb, nihilistic and driven -- not a good combination for emergency room work. Before long, he's pulling 24-hour shifts, ranking out potential suicides and ignoring everyone's advice to go on vacation.

One day, a boy who's been declared dead speaks to Joe, and shoots him a bug-eyed expression as his heart kicks back in and the score pulses sharply. (John Debney's score has more jolts than a car battery.) A day after he's revived, he asks the widower, "Are you Emily's Joe?"

Apparently the kid has seen Joe's wife on the other side ("Inside the rainbow"), and she needs to tell him something. Other dead and/or comatose patients back up the kid's story, and even his wife's old pet, a talking parrot, squawks out his deceased wife's needs. The only problem is, no one can remember exactly what she wants, what the message reads.

Joe obsesses as much as Kevin Costner can obsess. It's a contrary role for him; he has none of the easy charm that buoys his comedies, nor the intensity that steels his dramatic roles. He's as confused by and unattached to the script as we are, and tries to play it earnestly. It's not an earnest role; it requires someone to be unhinged, and Costner looks too clean and talks too clearly.

I won't give away too much more of the plot, but I will say that the film's namesake insect plays very little part in the film. (It was the same way with Richard Gere's recent "Mothman Prophecies" -- not a single damned moth to be seen. The insect world could use a better agent, I think.)

The aforementioned talking parrot has better dialogue than most of the cast. Joe Morton, Linda Hunt and Ron Rifkin deserve much better than this; they're made into anti-personalities, every one of them. They all but suck the color from the film. Can Costner win just once without going out of his way to make everyone else lose?

All you have to hold onto is Kathy Bates. The Oscar-winning actress is more interesting than anything put in front of her, and the way she entertains Joe's escalating stories of life-after-death is pure brilliance. He looks to her for substantiation; she makes him waffles and asks, "What kind of jelly you want? I got two kinds."

You like that? It's "Dragonfly's" most believable dialogue. We'll take strawberry, Kathy, and please pass Kevin the gruel. He seems to like it.