Rish Outfield's reviews
Roman Polanski, who directed Rosemary's Baby, returns with another film that touches on a devilish theme. Johnny Depp (is he a Scream Fiend yet?) is delightfully amoral hunting for the rarest books (at one point in the film, he discovers the rare Charles Schultz work where Charlie Brown kicks Lucy instead of the football), and is commissioned to compare three texts ghostwritten by Satan himself.
Less of a delight (to me, anyway) is Frenchwoman Emmanuel Seigner as a mysterious woman always lurking in the shadows. She wasn't hard to look at, but she drove me nuts by answering "If you say so," whenever Depp would ask her who she was or what she was thinking. Jeez, I HATE that!
There was actually very little of the normal Horror film variety in The Ninth Gate. Since it deals with an Evil topic (and due to the way it ends), it is of course, Horror. But for a minute there, I wasn't sure. I didn't really like this film, but I didn't really dislike it. I think a lot of folks felt that way. I'm sure tyranist's review is of more help to you.

The tyranist's thoughts
I haven't seen a Roman Polanski film since the last time I watched Rosemary's Baby and wouldn't you know it, this one is about devil worship too. I have to give the man credit, though, he's made a good one this time around. Not that his last effort was bad, I just identified more with this one.
Dean Corso (Johnny Depp) is a bibliophile who specializes in obtaining very valuable and rare editions of books for his clients, and he's good at his job. Things start becoming interesting when he is hired by Boris Balkan (Frank Langella) to authenticate his copy of The Book of the Nine Gates of the Kingdom of Shadows. Suddenly strange people are all around Corso and some of them even want to kill him. But what would you expect when you are carrying around a handbook on meeting Satan face to face?
The movie has a very nice feel to it in setting and characters. The score is also moody and creepy at times, but it does fail in a couple of parts. Depp did a fantastic job of portraying the main character. He seems to be born to this kind of performance. Some would probably compare the character with his Ichabod Crane, but I think there are facets beyond that.
In truth, I was doomed to enjoy this movie from the beginning since I am somewhat of a bibliophile myself. Unfortunately, it sort of breaks down toward the end and leaves me behind. For me the story around the book was fascinating and once they had moved past that (after about an hour and a half) then I didn't feel as involved. This is still a fine movie even if it didn't quite hold me to the end. Those who enjoyed Rosemary's Baby will enjoy this one as well as those of you who just dig on the occult and the world of books.