In a cutting edge laboratory, a brilliant child therapist uses a futuristic 'mind' machine to transfer herself into the psyche of a comatose boy.

Literally roaming around the boys' imagination, the psychologist, played by Lopez, attempts to exorcise the demons keeping the boy from making a recovery. The process becomes that much more problematic when she is asked to enter the mind of the recently comatosed serial killer Carl Stargher in an attempt to determine where he has stashed away his latest victim. Unless the good doctor wins the trust of the serial killer within 24 hours or so and manages to make him volunteer the information, the victim will die through an intricately planned automatic death trap.

The scenario is interesting enough and it gives director Tarsem Singh the freedom to create some brilliantly hallucinatory sequences all revolving around Lopez entering the mind of her patients and in a final sequence drawing the serial killer into her own imagination. While these sequences are wonderfully shot they are also the reason that the film fails to move along at a decent pace and in a coherent manner. The story suffers at the expense of the ultra stylish, glossy set pieces and for a thriller, The Cell lacks any kind of tension or menace. Singh attempts to compensate by adding some particularly nasty sequences involving D'Onofrio's serial killer and a dead victim towards the beginning of the film.

Films like Seven and The Silence of the Lambs brought tension, style and menace to the serial killer genre. In an attempt to up the shock value, a number of subsequent movies have tried to bring ever more unpleasantness to an already unsavoury topic. The Cell falls into the same trap following the thoroughly disagreeable 8mm before it. The end result is repulsive rather than scary.

Jennifer Lopez is unimpressive in a poorly etched role that requires her to don different personas and costumes for most of the film. Like most of the film, it's more style than content. Vince Vaughn has an inconsequential role and does little with it. On the brighter side of things, director Tarsem Singh shows considerable flair and given a better script could well be an interesting young director to watch. The Cell however, despite its glossiness and flash, is basically an empty shell.