By Nigel Powlson

DESPITE being one of the best and most influential TV shows

of the 1990s, The X-Files was allowed to peter out rather

unsatisfactorily.

First, it switched bases from Vancouver to LA, losing some

of the production darkness in the process, then it struggled on

for two years after the departure of one of its two major

stars, David Duchovny.

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Duchovny did reprise his role as FBI agent Fox Mulder in the

series' final death throes but not even that, or a first big

screen outing for The X-Files, left fans with any sense of

business being properly finished.

Now, six years on, Mulder and his former partner Dana Scully

(Gillian Anderson) are reunited for a second movie.

Mulder, unfairly disgraced and his work on the secretive

X-Files discredited, is living in bitter solitude when Scully,

now re-established as a full-time physician, comes calling with

an offer from the FBI to come temporarily back into the fold,

the past forgiven if not forgotten.

Special Agent Dakota Whitney (Amanda Peet) is trying to

trace a missing FBI operative and believes that Mulder's

understanding of the supernatural could help her crack the

case.

That's because her only lead is a paedophile priest (Billy

Connolly, below) who claims he has psychic powers that allow

him to see visions of the missing agent. Through him, the FBI

have discovered a severed arm buried in the snow and a clue

that there is something seriously sinister behind the

disappearance.

Writer-director Chris Carter has quite rightly jettisoned

the alien conspiracy theory mythology that was the hallmark of

the TV series and which was probably past its sell by date when

the first film was made. Instead, he goes down the Seven serial

killer route, with a lot of the action taking place in half

darkness in the snow or rain.

This helps create the right background, if not the familiar

tone, of the best episodes of the old series. Carter is,

however, hamper-ed by the need to gloss over all the loose ends

(Scully's cancer and her and Mulder's child barely get a

mention) before he can get into the story.

In the first couple of reels, only a cleverly creepy

performance from Connolly keeps us watching.

It's only when Mulder loses his ridiculous beard and Scully

stops tending a sick child and gets back to business that we

are fully engaged. Then, the old chemistry between the two

stars resurfaces and Mulder's need to believe and Scully's

conflict between her scientific knowledge and Catholic faith

reassert themselves.

It's still never as good as the best of the telly series –

maybe because what once seemed fresh has been so copied. In the

1990s, The X-Files predicted the rise of the internet as a tool

for conspiracy gossip as well as capturing the need for

religious sceptics to still believe there is something out

there.

But we have moved on and The X-Files, stuck with its out of

date template, can't.

Which is perhaps why it has been blown away at the US box

office by the new Batman film.

That suggests that this may well be the final X-Files case.

If so, then die-hard fans will be heartened that Mulder and

Scully are at least allowed to bow out gracefully, their

relationship satisfactorily concluded, something the TV series

denied them.

CERTIFICATE: 15.

RUNNING TIME: 104 mins.

STARTS: Showcase, Odeon and Cinema De Lux in Derby;

Cineworld in Burton; Cinebowl Uttoxeter.