The Ninth Gate

The Ninth Gate is a Spanish/French mystery movie based on the novel The Club Dumas by Arturo Pérez-Reverte. It was directed by Roman Polanski, and stars Johnny Depp, Lena Olin and Frank Langella. It premiered in Europe on August 25, 1999.

The movie starts with rare books-collector Frank Corso (Johnny Depp) getting a mission from publishing tycoon Boris Balkan (Frank Langella). Balkan has recently acquired a copy of The Nine Gates to the Kingdom of Shadows by 17th century author Aristide Torchia. The book details the summoning of the devil. Balkan is certain the book is a forgery. He wants Corso to find the other two known copies, find out whether any of them are genuine and - in that case - acquire them for Balkan.