Based on the French thriller Nathalie, Chloe features an impressive cast and a fairly well respected director.  The Sweet Hereafter’s Atom Egoyan is the director.  Working from a script by Erin Cressida Wilson, he directs former Oscar-nominees Julianne Moore and Liam Neeson, along with rising star Amanda Seyfried.  With all that talent and the promise of sexy thrills, how could it go wrong?  There are many ways to answer that question.

Moore and Neeson play Catherine and David Stewart, a Toronto couple whose marriage has turned passionless.  When he doesn’t return from a teaching appointment in New York in time for his surprise birthday party, Catherine suspects he was having an affair with one of his students.  To test her theory, she recruits Seyfried’s young prostitute, Chloe, to approach him and report back.  When Chloe reports back the events of the encounter in graphic detail, Catherine finds the news upsetting, but not for the reasons she expected.

Catherine is turned on by Chloe’s stories of the affair and although she tries to end it, she keeps finding herself drawn back into this web that she has created.  Chloe has also gotten invested in their relationship, and might even have eyes for Catherine’s son Michael.

I walked into this film with not necessarily with high but optimistic expectations.  For a small film, the cast is very impressive and the movie seemed poised to be the film that sends the rising Amanda Seyfried over the top.  It’s a very brave performance by the young actress who bares it all, but unfortunately, it is not a very good performance.

The problem really stems from the script.  The dialogue itself is so bad that it is not even unintentionally funny. And when it is delivered in such a stale fashion, the result is just audibly ugly.  Seyfried is the main offender of the poorly delivered dialogue.  Her line readings that should be sexy are delivered in matter-of-fact sort of way.  Without any level of sexiness to it, the dialogue sounds like exactly what it is: filthy.

The whole basis of the plot is brought down by her dull dialogue as we just don’t believe that a straight, married woman could be seduced by her.  The movie opens with Chloe’s voice-over narration telling us that she can use her words to become whoever the client wants her to be, but she spends the rest of the movie disproving that statement.  The dialogue also blatantly gives away the film’s attempt at a major plot twist, making the movie’s direction completely predictable.

In its final act, Chloe becomes a Fatal Attraction rehash, but at no time does it produce any real thrill.  The ending can’t come quick enough.  This is an attempt at a sexy thriller that failed to be either sexy or thrilling.

Chloe is rated R for “strong sexual content including graphic dialogue, nudity and language.”  There were times when I felt like I wandered into a porn film, so if sex, nudity, and dirty language aren’t your thing, I wouldn’t recommend it.

Courtesy of a local publicist, Jeff attended a promotional screening of Chloe.