Articles

TELEVISION REVIEW The End Zone
For 'X-Files,' the plot thickens as it heads for alien big screen By Matthew Gilbert, Globe Staff, 05/18/98

Talk about conspiracies. The makers of ''The X-Files'' are amid a massive and unusual plot that, if it succeeds, could rival ''Armageddon.'' It could have a ''Deep Impact'' on the movie industry. It could become a ''Lethal Weapon 4'' for studios seeking to make a killing at the box office ...
The big plot is to connect the story line of the popular ''X-Files'' TV series to that of a $60 million ''X-Files'' summer movie, thereby motivating some 20 million fans to rise out of their armchairs and visit their local multiplex. Will fans pay nearly $8 apiece for what they can watch for free on TV? It may be the first time this kind of multimedia crossover from a still-prime-time show has been attempted.

And so last night's season finale of ''The X-Files'' was particularly important, as it sets up the movie, which opens June 19. Naturally, it was an hour filled with teasing, head-scratching twists related to the series-length conspiracy thread. Has there ever been a TV show that drops so many fat, juicy clues, yet seems to divulge almost no real information? Have there ever been scriptwriters so practiced at the art of evasion? >>Sometimes watching ''The X-Files'' is like swimming against a powerful current. The episode began with a wonderfully tense scene in which a shooting is about to occur in a large hall where a boy and a man are playing competitive chess. The 12-year-old avoids the bullet but, as Agent Mulder immediately realizes, he has been targeted because he's special - a mind reader, we learn, who is part alien. Mimi Rogers, as Mulder's ex-girlfriend, Agent Fowler, is also on hand to help in the case, although she ultimately blows everything by falling asleep. (By the way, the episode is shameless in promoting the Fox network, as the boy is seen watching ''The Simpsons'' and then ''King of the Hill.'')

Some of the best moments were the small ones between Fowler and Gillian Anderson's Agent Scully, as they work together despite jealousy over Mulder. The jealousy, along with almost every other emotion on ''The X-Files,'' is subterranean and titillating. The emotional landscape of the show is as intentionally foggy and indistinct as the conspiracy plot. But while coolness and intelligence and understatement can turn into DOA TV, David Duchovny, Anderson, and the rest have managed to make those traits wonderfully compelling over the years. Connected to the fate of the boy, of course, were a couple of bigger-than-anyone-knows developments. Cigarette Smoking Man is back in town, pulled in by double agent Alex Krycek, and he admits to being the father of Agent Spender, who is played by the actor (Chris Owens) who played Young Cigarette Smoking Man. And most important of all, Cigarette Smoking Man sets Mulder's office, and the X-Files in particular, on fire - but only after he has removed the file on Samantha Mulder. Burn down Mulder's mission - a very clever way to clear the slate for the movie.

What does it all mean? While promotion for the movie promises it will provide some definitive answers about the mysteries at the core of ''The X-Files,'' don't count on it. It wouldn't be ''The X-Files'' if it didn't play hard-to-get like nobody's business, giving enough information to satisfy, yet withholding critical pieces to keep you hooked. If we are handed certain truths on the big screen, aren't they certain to lead to other, even larger and more paranoid questions?

This story ran on page D06 of the Boston Globe on 05/18/98.

© Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company.




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