Loch Ness

Dr. Jonathan Dempsey (Ted Danson), a burned-out American cryptozoologist much ridiculed for his fruitless pursuit of Sasquatch, is ordered to Scotland by his superior to determine once and for all the existence of the Loch Ness monster; a hard-nosed, skeptical approach will redeem Dempsey in the science community. Dempsey reluctantly agrees and rooms at a local pub owned by Laura MacFeteridge (Joely Richardson) and her nine-year-old daughter Isabel (Kirsty Graham). He hires a boat and an assistant to probe the loch's depths, but meets resistance from the local water bailiff (Ian Holm), and his state-of-the-art sonar is intentionally destroyed by other ships.

Ready to pack up and leave, Dempsey finds an undeveloped roll of film from his late predecessor. One frame shows a mysterious fin. Dempsey resumes the monster hunt, but his boat is capsized by a huge creature. Being hot on the track of an unknown animal revives the American's spirits considerably, and his affection for Laura blooms into an love affair. Then Isabel draws a picture of a monster whose fin exactly matches the one in the photo, and tells the scientist she will take him to where it lives if he gets her a red bicycle.

In caves beneath a ruined castle Isabel introduces her friends, two gigantic but playful marine creatures. Dempsey snaps his own pictures, the electronic flash panicking the creatures, hurling Isabel into the water. She escapes unharmed, but Laura is livid at Dempsey. He schedules a press conference in London to present his one clear photo, with both Laura and the water bailiff warning of the consequences of Dempsey's ambition, for the loch and his personal life. At the press conference, Dempsey shows an elite audience only a blurry image and Isabel's drawing, then returns to Scotland. He gives Isabel her red bike, then embraces Laura.

The film tells its tale in a lightweight, Disney vein, featuring appealing performances from an attractive cast, and a fine score by Trevor Jones. Clive Tickner's location lensing of Scotland's Inverness region is the real star, with lovely widescreen picture-postcard views of rolling hills and misty meadows. The monsters are also convincingly rendered by computer graphics and Jim Henson's Creature Shop, even if their presence dumps canned Spielberg awe onto a delicate romantic comedy. The story may be completely predictable, the sappy ending totally lame, but this surpasses an earlier lake monster kidflick MAGIC IN THE WATER (1995), whose scuttling at the box office may explain why LOCH NESS took two years to get a theatrical release, and then only in England. It premiered in the US on network television, in the wake of Danson's highly rated adaption of GULLIVER'S TRAVELS. (Profanity, sexual situations.) leave a comment