Sarah Polley. You'll remember her from such movies as "Go," and the recent, "My Life Without Me". Well, I remembered her name anyway, which is what prompted me to watch "No Such Thing" on the Sundance channel.

You 'Member:

"No Such Thing" starring the aforementioned Sarah Polley, Robert John Burke, and executively produced by Francis Ford Coppola sounded like a good thing. The tagline read: a cub reporter becomes involved with an Icelandic monster. Sounds intriguing . . . a young, hot intern (Polley) is fetching coffee for a top TV news exec. (whom is a real bitch) when she discovers that her fiancée, a camera man for a news crew covering a story about an Icelandic monster, is dead. I know what you are thinking. This "Icelandic monster" must be a bad-ass mutha fucka, like a crime lord, like Scarface or something.

The Intern convinces the exec. to let her travel to Iceland in search of her man and the rest of the news crew. But there is trouble a brewin'. The transatlantic flight transporting out "cub reporter" plummets to the sea. Miraculously, she is one of the few survivors. She winds up in an Hospital in Reykjavik, Iceland. There she undergoes a very dangerous and painful operation to regain the use of her limbs. It's a nice change of pace to see a government that is so together as to offer free medical care to someone who has nothing (mainly no insurance). In fact, the whole time she's in the hospital we are reminded how far behind the United States is in terms of compassion and caring.

After some months, our hero is fully recovered and once again sets out in search of her lost love. This is where the movie devolves. It transforms from an inspiring tale of the human heart overpowering all odds to find love into an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, albeit with very gorgeous locations. She travels to the edge of Iceland, where she stumbles upon a settlement, a village on the very edge of civilization and stumbling toward insanity. After many shots of . . . whatever they drink in Iceland . . . the villagers finally agree to take her to "the monster".

Surprise, she becomes the newest piece of meat for our villain, a real monster.

But he is not just any old monster. He is a foul mouthed, human eaten', depression sufferin', alcoholic monster . . . that is invincible!

Beatrice, our hero, realizes her love is dead and then sets out to help the monster ease his own suffering. Talk about forgiving! Beatrice and the monster (who becomes an international sensation), set out to find the only man who can end the Monster's suffering, a mad scientist by the name of Dr. Artoe. Sadly, in the reality of the movie and in the reality of the viewer, the novelty of a monster wears off and we soon find our monster longing to end his existence. Apparently, you can kill a monster by proving that it's a figment of your imagination. Have to remember that in case I ever find myself in a jam. . . The duality of the end with the beginning is nice: one character struggling to live, while the other is struggling to die.

<<SPOILER ALERT>>

<<In the end Beatrice kills the monster using the power of her heart not her hand.>> Basically, this a delightful modern fairy tale that proves that things like pain and monsters are cerebral, and if you believe enough you will see that there is no such thing.

Favorite Monster Quote: " . . . unless of course I am God, in which case I'd still be fucked!"