Nightwatch (1998)

At the beginning before the credits, a naked woman (a prostitute), wrapped in a bath towel, greets an unseen male client at night. The scene is a creepy one as she does all of the talking while the camera angle is of the eyes of the guest. Before climbing onto a table, she asks her customer if he still wants her to play dead. The unseen man pulls out a large knife and stabs her to death.Martin Bells (Ewan McGregor), a law student, has just taken a job as a night watchman (8 pm-4 am) in an eerie city morgue. A strange and eccentric retiring night watchman (Lonny Chapman) escorts Bells throughout the main premises, telling him anecdotes and advising him to "get a radio." The building, unoccupied at night, houses not just a morgue but also a forensics lab where dismembered human body parts are preserved in jars filled with formaldehyde. The hallway is long. In the morgue's cold room, above each covered body is an alarm cord, in case the corpse rises (!) (according to the retiring watchman). The room door has no inside handles. The watchman's rounds include a time clock on the far wall of the cold room, so that he has to enter the entire room to get to it. The night watchman himself works alone in an office at a large lobby unlit after hours. Moths trapped in the office lighting provide a flickering look. On the office wall is a 19th century photo of Lewis Powell (a/k/a Lewis Payne), one of the assassins of Abraham Lincoln. The creaky elevator sticks while strange noises sometimes emanate from the building. The morgue is indeed an ominous place. And for the first part of the film there is genuine eeriness; in the second half the movie collapses. In the city a serial murderer is on the loose; he kills prostitutes. Police inspector Tom Cray (Nick Nolte) stops into the morgue to advise Bells that a fresh body, a murdered young lady, is being delivered. The killer removes the eyes of the dead women. The cop might have added that a molester of corpses is also running amok. One night the emergency red light in the watchman's office flickers. Bells has to check it out alone as the night doctor is not available for 30 minutes. It turns out that Bells' unhinged friend James (Josh Brolin) has made one of his practical jokes. He had somehow slipped into the morgue one evening and hidden under a sheet on a gurney in the cold room and slowly raised himself as from the dead. Boo! I scared you! Other strange events also occur, and they make little sense. One of these involves the body of a dead prostitute that was dragged down the corridor to the exit door, leaving a trail of smeared blood everywhere. "Why," one may ask? And how could the killer sneak in and do what he did, including clean-up? And how did Martin miss seeing it the first time he was there, in the well-lit cold room? When I first saw this, I thought it could be the watchman dreaming, but no. Anyway, soon Bells realizes that he is being framed by the killer. By the way, the murderer once worked in the medical examiner's office years ago and was dismissed for necrophilia. How can Bells trap the real killer? The script is below par. Character development is weak, and we never know the motivations of McGregor, Patricia Arquette (his girlfriend Katherine), Brad Dourif (the duty doctor), Nolte, or anybody else. Brolin's purpose is to serve as the red herring. The use of "This Old Man (Knick-Knack Paddy-Whack)" song has a reason that will escape many, although during the denouement the killer whistles the tune, alerting the Patricia Arquette character to her precarious situation. We never do discover the significance of Powell's photo in the watchman's office. The main achievement of the movie is the creepy and claustrophobic atmosphere of the morgue. But the film could have been done so much better! Remade from the Danish film, "Nattevagten" (1994).

A law student takes a job as the night-watch in a morgue, thinking that he will have much time to study, with his biggest problem being his paranoia. But in the history of this morgue was once a man raping female corpses, but has history really gone......A remake of a film I've never seen, Nightwatch was supposed to be Macgregors big break into Hollywood, but 1997 was Ewan's Anu Horribilus....The man was hot stuff after Trainspotting, Brassed Off, and Shallow Grave, but this bombed, and Hodge, Boyle, and Ewan couldn't recapture the magic with a Life Less Ordinary.So to be fair, not counting a certain pillage of a franchise, Macgregor never really got noticed in Hollywood until 2005 with The Island.Despite this films flaws, is still enjoyable, despite the fact that Brolins character should have been called Red Herring, and Arquette does very little. Macgregor plays a fresh faced student, who has it all, girlfriend, apartment, strange friend, and even stranger job.But he soon becomes prime suspect for all the murders that are happening, because dastardly Nick Nolte is setting him up, as Nolte has a history, which is heavily hinted on many occasion.Brolin is way too over the top to make you suspect him, as is Dourif, so you know from the upstart that Nolte will be the killer, which spoils the rest of the film.So apart from one very good scene involving Arquette finding a body (the whole scene is very early eighties De Palma), its all pretty generic stuff, which is a shame as now I've no interest in seeing the original, which may sound ignorant, but what's the point if you know who the killer is.....

Well, lets just start of by saying this movie is no way near as good as the original movie "Nattevagten", of which this movie is a remake but it's still being a pretty good and fun whodunit to have a good time with.Kind of weird to notice how different this movie is in atmosphere and approach, since it actually got directed by the same director who made the original, 3 years prior to this American remake. And it's not just different but also most definitely less effective. There is not as much tension and mystery in this one, also due to some pacing issues (it's too fast paced at times) and a poor buildup to things.And all while this movie in essence is still being just like the original. Not much had been changed in its story really and I was therefore also quite surprised to find out Steven Soderbergh was involved with the writing. Guess it was an easy paycheck for him, since really not all that much had been changed or added to the movie, when compared to the original movie.While the original was being a whole lot of different things, this movie is just being a more simple and more straightforward thriller, or rather said whodunit. So really, don't expect this movie to provide you with any horror but as a mystery/thriller, I can still see this movie entertaining a whole bunch of people out there, of course especially those who aren't familiar with the original movie already.And really, the movie on its own is really being quite good and entertaining for what it is. It really doesn't handle everything well, mainly stuff concerning the earlier mentioned pacing and buildup to things but as a whole it's still being a better movie than just the average genre attempt. There are plenty of thrills and surprises in it, that help to keep you invested in the movie.It also has a cast to die for. Really an all-star cast, of which some actors are better known now days as back then. Ewan McGregor plays the main lead, while the movie further more stars Patricia Arquette, Nick Nolte, a still very young looking Josh Brolin, Brad Dourif and John C. Reilly. Not that this movie features any of their best or most interesting and challenging performances but still, it's always good to see so many talented people together on screen.A definitely good enough movie as a straightforward thriller.7/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Though somewhat flawed, "Nightwatch" delivers the suspense and blood, although in the end logic flies out the window. Ewan McGregor is perfectly cast as a law student with the bizarre job of guarding dead bodies in the medical examiners office. Nick Nolte plays a police detective very well, and John C. Reilly is his sidekick. In addition there is Josh Brolin as McGregor's eccentric friend, Patricia Arquette as a bewildered girlfriend, and Brad Dourif as an ultra strange doctor. The film is very creepy, unpredictable, with at least a bunch of "red herrings", and builds tension nicely. Only the somewhat rushed conclusion fails to convince. What precedes it however is highly entertaining. Recommended, although it is not for the squeamish. - MERK