Synopsis: Amazon.comThis complicated mystery, directed with passionate intensity by Katherine Bigelow (Near Dark), deserves better than the paltry distribution it received in theaters. Granted, it’s a tough sell: a contrast between the emotional unrest in a group of modern travelers and a hundred-year-old murder case on a desolate New England island. A photographer (Catherine McCormack) is researching the old case, and we flip back and forth between time periods as she uncovers new clues. The parallel-story structure is often tricky to pull off in movies, and Bigelow, working from the Anita Shreve novel, doesn’t entirely solve it here. But the old mystery, set in a strict Norwegian community, is compelling, and the cast is stronger than the material: Sarah Polley and the late Katrin Cartlidge are stand-outs in the 1873 scenes, and Sean Penn (believably insufferable) and Elizabeth Hurley flirt naughtily in the modern. –Robert HortonProduct DescriptionElizabeth Hurley, Josh Lucas, Sean Penn. Two couples journey to an isolated island manor to investigate a century-old double murder, believing that the real murderer has escaped justice-while jealousy and betrayal begin to separate them. 2000/color/113 min/R/widescreen.