PREMIERE.COM'S MOVIE REVIEW (posted 8/4/06)

In the early '90s, novelist Armistead Maupin (Tales of the City) had one of those experiences that proves that truth is often stranger than fiction. Through his publisher, Maupin received an autobiography penned by a 14-year-old boy that detailed a shocking childhood filled with physical, sexual and emotional abuse at the hands of his parents. Eventually, he escaped from his brutal home and was taken in by a kind social worker. Touched by the young man's life story, Maupin began speaking with him and his adopted mother over the phone on a regular basis. There was never a doubt in his mind that he was talking to a real kid…until his then-lover pointed out that the boy and the woman had virtually identical voices. As Maupin investigated the situation, he discovered that almost no one had actually met this child in person, not even anyone at the company publishing his book. Further inquiry suggested that the boy never existed in the first place and may just have been a figment of his "mother's" imagination.

Maupin's efforts to learn the truth about the mystery child were detailed in a New Yorker article by Tad Friend and by the author himself in his 2001 roman a clef, The Night Listener. Now the story has entered its third incarnation as a film version of the novel, featuring Robin Williams as Maupin's fictional counterpart, writer Gabriel Noone. Unfortunately, something got lost in the translation from page to screen. Both Friend's article and Maupin's book are terrific reads, with the former focusing on the specifics of the case, while the latter is more of a think piece disguised as a mystery, in which the author contemplates the way he too takes liberties with the truth in his own writing. This naval-gazing approach could be clunky and grating in the wrong hands, but Maupin's natural wit carries the day in the novel, bringing a certain reality to a decidedly surreal situation.

As it turns out, wit is precisely the element that's missing from Patrick Stettner's film. Obviously, the premise doesn't exactly allow for a laugh riot, but a little humor would go a long way to making these characters resemble human beings instead of morose robots. Williams sets the tone for the movie with another one of his somnambulant "serious" performances and the rest of the cast—which includes Toni Collette, Bobby Cannavale and Sandra Oh in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance—follows his lead. Stettner's direction proves equally one-note; his visuals are heavy on mood, but light on any sense of actual mystery. It's surprising that a story with such a great hook could be turned into a flat, uninvolving film. The recent brouhaha over James Frey and Kaavya Viswanathan should make The Night Listener seem all the more timely, but somehow the movie ends up feeling like a museum piece or, worse still, a work of fiction. —Ethan Alter