So this is a movie based on one of Edgar Allan Poe's popular short stories. Although it's not all that close to it, except the movie deals with heartbeats and murders. Josh Lucas is the main protagonist in this movie and he plays a single father raising a daughter that has an illness. But when he gets a heart transplant and meets a female doctor that he starts a relationship with, things start to change. Especially within himself. Josh Lucas is actually really good in this, in fact he sort of reminds me of an American version of Daniel Craig. The thing is the beginning interested me than the rest of the movie. The mystery of trying to figure out what is going on kinda drives this movie. But when finding out what is going on, it just basically goes in a narrow and not very interesting direction. Overall the mystery aspect of this movie is kinda interesting but the rest is just mundane.5.5/20

An obvious re-make of the Poe story, there is good suspense here and Josh Lucas makes the character noteworthy and sympathetic.There is a side-story with his daughter also being sick as he is recipient of a heart transplant. Lucas begins to investigate the death of his donor Jean Vielliard, whom he finds out murdered himself and his wife. Brian Cox is very good as usual, as a detective who is aware that suspicious deaths are happening around the hospital.While the story has been done, this has a decent twist, a good scene with Dallas Roberts as an evil transplant surgeon, and overall interesting viewing.Anyone interested in the actual Edgar Allen Poe story should watch the Vincent Price film, and also there was a very good version on PBS in the late 80's starring Treat Williams as the murderer. Worth viewing and a good tale. 9/10.

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.

First off, this is not any kind of interpretation of Poe's story; Modern or otherwise. The only thing similar is that the main character can hear a heart beat, sometimes. Suspense is held throughout the movie! It held my full attention and I couldn't wait to see what happened next. That's all I will say about the actual plot to not spoil anything. There is graphic violence, and overall the film has a depressing mood to it. Why then did I give a 7? The acting by everyone is great..except for the English doctor's! it was horrendous! Her lines sucked and she made me feel awkward. So bad that it takes away from the rest of the movie. Overall, a good flick to check out.