What if the person you were talking to on the phone really wasn't who you thought he was? That is the premise behind The Night Listener, based on a phone conversation between a radio show host and a young boy whose existence could never be proved. Unfortunately, in this case the true life events were likely more compelling than this bland adaptation.For a basic plot summer, "Night Listener" tells the store of a radio talk show host (played by Robin Williams) who takes a liking to a young boy supposedly dying from a terrible disease. However, as the relationship builds, "Williams" has reason to believe that the boy may not be who he says he is (or even exist at all), thus leading to a personal investigation to find out the truth.Now, had the film actually stuck to that basic plot line, it might have been a halfways decent thriller. Instead, for whatever reason, it focuses far too much on the personal demons of "Williams" (e.g. his character's homosexuality really doesn't add anything to the film, yet is explored in great detail). Also, the relationship between "Williams" and the mystery boy in question's mother is ultimately crucial to understanding the film's conclusion, but is again too much about HIS perspective, not HERS. Like I said, more focus on the mystery at hand would have made for a more compelling experience.Thus, I think a 1.5-star rating perfectly pegs this movie, as it was only good enough to make you want to see how things turn out in the end, not so much caring about the journey to get to that point. Also, it comes nowhere close to, say, "One Hour Photo" in terms of establishing Williams as a serious actor and not just a manic comedian.

Starring: Robin Williams as Gabriel No oneToni Collette as Donna D. LogandRory Culkin as Pete D. LogandSandra OH as Anna The Night Listener is a tightly made psychological suspense film. The film crept up in 2006. It is an eerie tale that wraps you in slowly, with its character development and involvement. Its themes linger long after the film is over.Gabriel No one (played by Robin Williams) is a late night radio talk show host. In the beginning of the film Gabriel narrates an unusual tale, telling of his latest encounter to his listeners. His narration continues throughout the production, detailing some situations as a means of providing character development. He describes his job, which is telling stories, often exaggerated but somewhat based in truth. In this instance he wants his audience to be aware that he will try his best not to fabricate or exaggerate this tale, although it may seem exaggerated and unbelievable, this is a true story. Gabriel No one is vulnerable due to his separation with is his partner Jess (played by Bobby Cannavale) of eight years. He is having a difficult time coping, and is unable to work with this and other distractions. After one of his work sessions, Gabriel's boss discusses an idea for a book that they could author. The basis is a manuscript written by a young fourteen year old boy. The boy's story is about his up-bringing, and of the abuse that he had suffered. Gabriel takes an interest in the boy who is named Peter Logand (played by Rory Culkin) and in his adopted mother Donna Logand (played by Toni Collette). After reading the details of the boy's encounters, and learning of his and his families troubling and disturbing behavior, Gabriel understood why the boy had been affected physically and psychologically.Gabriel's state of vulnerably made the relationship with Pete all the easier. He could empathize with the boy. He took time to communicate with him and took the time necessary to share quality time with him. As their relationship grows through private communication over the phone, Gabriel's only sense is visualizing the family in his mind. One day while Gabriel's power was out, Jess observed the phone call while fixing Gabriel's power, Jess told him that the boy and Donnas' voice were the very same. The result was Gabriel's examination of all that he had accepted as true. Gabriel gained more curiosity and interest and a strong desire to unlock the mystery of the family. There is a parallel between the characters of Gabriel and Donna, they both create stories and ideas that are intended to attract the interest of others. Gabriel used parts of his relationship to create stories for his show, while Donna takes the idea further.Robin Williams's portrayal of Gabriel No one resulted in a very convincing performance which is as memorable as his 2002 film One Hour Photo. He plays the character with such great venerability and emotion, that you believe he is Gabriel No one and share in his concerns as he experiences the complexities of his relationships. Having Pete in his life lessens his plight as it addresses the void, the emptiness in his life.Toni Collette (Donna) delivers the most chilling performance in the film in spite of being cast in a role that must have been difficult to portray, a character that has many different kinds of psychological disorders. When it is realized that this film is based on a true story it is even more chilling. A terrifying, unsettling mood envelopes you, as it is learned that some among us in reality have this factual disorder. Patrick Stettner directed this piece. The phone conversations through the first half of the film were brilliantly done, showing the perspective of Gabriel's initial understanding of Peter and Donna. This serves to intensify the mood as he is forced to alter his perceptions as his view of reality changes in the second half of the film.This film is very good; however, it may be too intense. Perhaps what is keeping it from being an excellent film is the humor or lack of it. Humor could have been used to ease the tension of the suspense at the same time intensifying it, by providing a contrast to the continual unbroken drama. All other aspects exceeded well beyond the typical suspense film especially the development of thought-provoking characters, action and settings which varied in atmosphere from the contrast of New York's brightly lit day to dark and cold wintery Wisconsin. The director of photography Lisa Rinzler created a scene in particular that was startling at the hospital, where Gabriel went into the parking garage and through the dank hallway with little to no light. Making the scene all the more creepy and unsettling, upon being discovered, showing his expression of fright, and displaying more darkness and dinginess with pipes dripping as Gabriel descends out of the bottom of a unkempt hospital. This is a truly memorable scene. I highly recommend viewing this film. It may be especially beneficial to those studying psychology. Thoughts of events and emotional experiences developed in this film will linger in your mind long after the film is over.Rating: 3 ½ out of 4

It is always interesting when Robin Williams strays outside the space in which he is most effective (or not, as some may argue).As in "Insomnia" and "One Hour Photo", his character here is more complex. Williams plays an acclaimed writer, Gabriel No one, who has also parlayed his writing into a successful late night radio show.Williams' troubles start when an avid fan makes contact with him during a slump period in his career and personal life. The fan is a boy with a terminal condition who starts sharing stories of the terrible abuse he suffered while growing up.As the relationship deepens, a more sinister aspect emerges, and the movie shifts into a mystery mode.The problem is that the pace is too slow, and it becomes clear too early in the plot what is going on. The story also fails to build interest or anxiety especially around the imperilment of Williams' character.And that's ultimately a casting problem, because in concept there's actually nothing wrong.

The Night Listener is a "six monther" for me. That term refers to an elite group of movies I can (and usually do) watch at least every six months. Classics like "Deliverance," "Apocalypse Now," "The Birds," "Sideways," "The Beast Within," "Win a Date with Tad Hamilton," "The Green Berets," among others. The Night Listener reaches this level of perfection because of Robin Williams. No actor alive imbues the subdued comical world of a stereotypical World Weary Middle Age Gay Man (all rights reserved) like he does. Insert that stock figure into a moody soft boiled film lavender (as opposed to a hard boiled film noir) mystery involving an obligatory May – September thing going south while the older man develops a dangerous (but ostensibly non- pederastic) telephone obsession with a young boy he will never meet, and who may not even exist, and you have the making of something, well, interesting in a FABULOUS offbeat way. The relationship ending scenes in the beginning and middle of the movie between Williams and his roving junior boyfriend are inadvertently hilarious because the senior Williams' tight-assed daddy character is eventually driven to exasperated excretory profanity. There is nothing quite like Robin Williams putting that ever so slightly prissy bit of hemorrhoidal indignation to the "F" word when he is playing gay.After rejection, it's great fun watching Williams' unlikely detective work unfold as his character shambles and sighs through all the scripted midlife existentialism and small town intrigues along the way to an ambiguous denouement, and this makes the movie a very satisfying and leisurely paced piece of camp entertainment. Especially wonderful is Williams 'dinner date with a nasty vending machine Kaiser-roll sandwich (san microwave) late one night in a fleabag motel lobby that sets up, predictably, a crucial plot twist. It's all sort of like enjoying one of those badly written, but wonderfully sleazy Gothic novels over a couple of big mugs of hot cocoa while curled up in a clean sheeted bed after a nice long Calgon bath on a blustery or cold rainy night after the cable goes out. This movie is not Hitchcock, but like Hitchcock's work, it mates its sense of style, especially attention to stylistic details, and its mood so appropriately to its characters that the background is almost itself a form of characterization. Robin Williams' perfectly arranged and cluttered city townhouse where he lives alone since his "young" man left him is an extended evocation of his fey despair, and the shabby Midwestern town he winds up in chasing after the phantom boy looks like a postcard series for edge of the world hopelessness. What is even more fascinating than the movie itself is the information revealed (perhaps inadvertently) in the DVD special features about gay body/age perceptions and aspirations. The older, more erudite and hirsute Williams and his buffed, shaved "younger man" are an expected pop culture distortion and idealization of the real life Armistead Maupin and his former partner, Terry Anderson, the co-writers of the film's screenplay, and upon whom the events in the movie are supposedly loosely based to some degree. The reality is both are rather average looking, bearish men of similar looking ages. I guess this means, despite the mythic reputations of Isherwood, Bachardy, Versace, etc., that reality among most mature worldly gay men of means and talent really does involve, more often than not, what they have to settle (or pay) for. That would be enough to make them world weary.