The Cry of the Owl (2009) | Rotten Tomatoes (2025)

Audience Reviews

angela g this movie is better than what the reviews say the acting is great and the twist is great as well Rated 4/5 Stars • Rated 4 out of 5 stars 07/17/24 Full Review Jelisije J I get slow burns, but this movie really takes the cake with its huge pacing issue and with its ridiculous unrealistic story that I couldn't believe real life people will say or do anything that happened in with this movie. Rated 1/5 Stars • Rated 1 out of 5 stars 03/08/23 Full Review Liam D It comes so close to because a good psychological thriller but the unnecessary long runtime and boring pacing really hurts the movie Rated 2.5/5 Stars • Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 12/11/22 Full Review Audience Member Just pointless. Absolutely pointless. Every single person in this movie was just unrealistic and insane. Rated 1.5/5 Stars • Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 02/17/23 Full Review ronald h In spite of its promising premise, _The Cry of the Owl_ is strangely flat and uninteresting. The dialogue is stilted and stiff, and the mediocre acting makes things even worse.Robert (Paddy Considine), a man who has suffered depression in his past (and maybe his present), is going through a divorce and has left the city and moved to a small town. In the beginning, we see him spying on a young woman who lives alone in a big country house. He does this habitually. The woman, Jenny (Julia Stiles), catches him peeping one night. But surprisingly, she ends up inviting him in for coffee. Eventually, she starts following him around and trying to start a relationship with him. Jenny's boyfriend Greg (James Gilbert) is not happy about this and ends up confronting Robert. A fight ensues, and Robert leaves him lying on the ground by a river, alive but dazed. Next thing we know, Greg has disappeared, and the cops suspect Robert is responsible. Sounds like thriller material, but there's not much thrilling going on here. The movies moves slowly, but not like a slow burn in which suspense builds slowly. Rather, it just plods.I never thought Julia Stiles was much of an actress. Here, we're guessing that her character will turn out to be a psycho bitch, but she just has zero complexity. She delivers her lines like a manikin. Considine is a competent actor, but for some reason, he doesn't manage to make Robert very likeable or sympathetic. A bad script and lackadaisical direction are at least partly to blame for that. The other actors fare no better, including the two detectives, who are basically cardboard cutouts.Because there is a mystery involved, I hung in there to see the outcome. The reveal about 70 minutes into the story is so predictable and ludicrous, I can't believe I didn't see it coming. Perhaps its because I was so disinterested to begin with. But incredibly, things get even sillier after the reveal. By the end, I was asking myself, "Why did I sit through this?" Rated 2/5 Stars • Rated 2 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Audience Member It started out kinda slow and unbelievable and I almost stopped watching it, but I kept on watching and ultimately got really into it. I was tryin to figure out who was actually behind all the pitfalls Robert was facing. Everyone was a suspect even Jenny's bestfriend's Susie's partner but then the movie just ended explaining nothing and to me that's so frustrating. I felt I just wasted an hour and one half of my life I can never get back uuuggghhhh! Rated 3/5 Stars • Rated 3 out of 5 stars 01/17/23 Full Review Read all reviews

The Cry of the Owl

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