Watch Chocolate For Free

To me, this movie is perfection.

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Henry Thomas plays a soul dead guy who's senses are very high. He works in a place where they make artificial flavors for food and he has a keen sense of taste and smell. But his life is empty. He is separated form his wife and son and trying to feel something. Out of the blue he starts feeling the emotions and physical pleasures of a woman he never met and is far away. And he falls in love with her because he feels her from the inside. So he sets out to find her.Mick Garris' movies are considered horror movies, but if you really watch them there is more than blood, guts and gore. They are usually human stories with a horror like twist like Riding The bullet. I got that one right away, but most people were disappointed with it.This one I liked because I feel for Henry Thomas. When you hit middle age you do kind of get bored of life. I like the movies that have characters that I can relate to, because it does trigger feelings for them. Isn't that what a story is supposed to do?

More like a thriller, but still at least average. That's how I felt about it. i liked the acting and how the story develops. But overall it does not achieve greatness. The actors are convincing enough and you will most likely know where this is going very fast (although with an episodic running time, it is not that long to begin with), not that that's a bad thing.Being a bit supernatural, it does try to stay leveled and grounded throughout. Unlike Miikes episode this (and almost every other episode) most not have had any problems, with being shown completely uncut on it's initial run on the TV.

The Masters of Horror television series only lasted "two seasons," but while it was "on," it was a breeding ground for amazingly original ideas. Mick Garris's self-written Chocolate, from one of his books (if I'm not mistaken, A Life in the Cinema), is a brilliant and fascinating idea. Involving a bored single (newly divorced) man (played by the gorgeous Henry Thomas) who works in a chemical laboratory developing artificial food flavors, suddenly begins receiving sensory projections from an unknown woman. Then when the sensations end, he becomes obsessed with finding out where they came from, discovering the woman he thinks he's in love with isn't exactly an angel. The potential here for taking horror into new directions, making it dark and vague and interesting, is almost limitless. There's so much a good director can do with this material. But then, consider who the director is... It's Mick Garris. A man who got his "Masters of Horror" badge with television series, most of which would get a PG-13 rating, were they to have been inspected by the MPAA. A director whose previous film involved a college student having to decide whose soul the Grim Reaper should take- his or his mother's. A great fan of drama, but not a great director of drama. And unfortunately, he brings his trademark soggy, heavy-handed, all-wet approach to this film as well.So it plays as an emotional discovery film, not a creepy horror movie. Which means that when the intended shocks come in, they're as horrific as an old sock. I guess Garris was going for a first-person kind of thing. To try and put the audience in the position of the character, Jamie. So that when something bad happens to him, they're upset. Well... they might work for a mainstream thriller or a Lifetime TV-movie. But not a horror movie. I think all the best horror films that tried this kind of formula knew that a remove is very important. To be able to look at the whole situation as though it's comedy. It's over the top and grating, and takes itself much too seriously. The best attribute to the film is style. Garris definitely knows how to make a good looking movie (his previous, Riding the Bullet, was almost breath-taking for a TV movie) and the music score by his frequent collaborator Nicholas Pike (though some of it goes into the ultra-clichéd Classical genre), is also incredible. But without a real horror twist- something darker than what we're left with, it's just blah. Especially since they mix in elements of sexuality. They could have even gone the Clive Barker route, and made the character discover he likes some sexual experimentation (anything would've been fine), change him around somehow. Anything to make him talk in fewer poetic speeches, which all feel totally phony.On the positive side, the best thing about Chocolate is that it was shot in Canada. The locations they shot at are so beautiful, I want to go there. So, the scenes in the second half are pretty much better than those in the first half. Except for this whole sub-section where Jamie tries to make his best friend Wally (played the handsome, very well-aged Matt Frewer) believe him. Anyone else wish he had just kept it to himself? It would have been more adult to not have him care what other people think. It's a film about psychic transmissions anyway, no one ever believes people in those situations. Even I wouldn't believe anyone in that situation! When they finally get into 'the world' of Jamie's fantasy woman, we know almost exactly what's going to happen (the person I watched this with said right out loud what would happen before it did and she was right; and no, she hadn't seen it before) - the periodic narrations give that away - it's almost too late to care that it's not horrific. So I kind of marveled at how amazing the production / set design of her apartment was. The has this elaborate jungle painting all over her walls and it's a shame the scene wasn't longer or hadn't gone here before. Again, this points to what a good style director Garris can be at times. At least he gives us something to look at while we're waiting for it to end.But I can't help going back to just how much potential this piece had. It's done in a manner that only gives us traditional sensitivity in return. It doesn't pull any truly disturbing or dark strings. Take for example, the scene in which Jamie's having a psychic vaginal orgasm in bed... in front of his ex-wife and his son. His son thinks the woman Jamie spent the night with previously had done something to him and tries to sort-of attack her while the mother pulls the kid away. All the while, Jamie's writhing and groaning on the bed (without a hard-on, naturally, since again it's vaginal and taking place in his psyche). You could call this scene uncomfortable, but not for any reasons related to the genre. I don't really call embarrassment a typical reaction to a piece of horror. At least, not to one this shallow. Even when the film turns Jamie into a kind of stalker, the tone remains light and only casually mysterious. The only reason I finished watching this was because of the style. As a mystery, it's a big flop. It won't make you feel excited, it won't thrill you, it doesn't stir any deep emotions, and it doesn't play with your mind. It doesn't even play with your eyes, much. Had this been directed by someone who knew to change it or make it more dangerous, and the script been modified considerably, it could have been an epic. Or more refined and balanced than Clive Barker's bloated Lord of Illusions.

"Chocolate" is an excellent psychological thriller with supernatural overtones from director Mick Garris (who is largely responsible for bringing the excellent "Masters of Horror" project to the small screen).Henry ("E.T.") Thomas plays a man who specialises in creating artificial flavourings for the food industry. One day, he starts to see through the eyes of another person, a beautiful and sexy woman, as well as experiencing her sensations. This closeness, and other events, lead him to search for the mysterious girl and the two characters find their lives changed dramatically as a result.This episode of "Masters of Horror" has a slow burn but I loved the pace and the dramatic build up. The cast of this production are excellent and it's always great to see Matt Frewer. As can be expected from "Masters of Horror", the female cast are delightful. A special mention must go to the French-Canadian actress Lucie Laurier, who is delightful as the focus of Henry Thomas' emotions."Chocolate" is an absorbing 60 minutes of effective drama and another reason why "Masters of Horror" is the one of the greatest television series of the noughties. It's a simple but terrific tale, ably directed by Garris and featuring a great cast.Recommended viewing.