Under Suspicion
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Movie Reviews of Under Suspicion
Movie Review: Hackman and Freeman....what more could you ask for?
Summary: 3 Stars
I expected a little bit better from these two guys. Not too many fresh ideas in this film. But it is still worth the watch. It does have some slow spots to it...but it is worth it in the end. So...if you are looking for an average movie about "Who Done It?", give this movie a look.Movie Review: What 3 Stars
Loved it, loved it, loved it - until the end. What's up with that? Was he THAT unhappy? Or did the producer run out of money and have to think of a way to end things?Movie Review: Could someone PLEASE post an explanation of the ending?!?!?!
Summary: 3 Stars
This movie was fairly entertaining, but the ending is extremely unclear and succeeds only in ruining the whole movie.Movie Review: Underachiever
Summary: 2 Stars
You might wonder how with a cast that includes Morgan Freeman, Gene Hackman and Thomas Jane (Boogie Nights) can this remake of the 1981 French thriller Garde a Vue fall flat. It's obviously not in the acting, and Lost in Space director Stephen Hopkins does a suprisingly good job at the helm. So it's got to be the writing, right? Well, not exactly. The writing is actually pretty good for the first hundred minutes or so, but it's when they try to pull the rug out from underneath us with it's obligatory twist ending (which is quickly becoming the biggest cliche in screenwriting), that things go array. The dialogue builds tension in a brilliantly subtle way but then they shoot themselves in the foot with a climax that makes everything that proceeded it seem meaningless.Freeman plays a Puerto Rico police captain who reluctantly calls in an old friend to be questioned regarding the murders of two young girls. Hackman's the prime suspect, having found the second body and spun an inconsistent story that doesn't match the facts of the case. The give and take between the two as Freeman unrelentingly interrogates Hackman's character is a marvel to watch and the only reason to see this movie at all.
Henry (Hackman) is the subject of this psychological rape as he's mercilessly grilled by the captain and his overzealous partner (Jane) into pouring out his every indiscretion to them. His story is picked apart and scrutinized until he's on the verge of a nervous breakdown. I suppose that's what the movie wants to be all about. It's not much interested in being a crime thriller but has much loftier goals in mind. It wants to turn the looking glass on a corruptible system of police work, even when it's inadvertent, that puts such a strain on the accused. That's the real intention of of film, to suggest that the crime's not in the criminal offense itself but in being held under suspicion (thus the title which was modified from the novel "Brainwash" by John Wainwright).
During the course of the movie Hackman has his civil liberties stripped away one by one, and by focusing so intensly on his ordeal it undermines the fact that two children have been violated and murdered. This would be a tense, taunt suspense thriller is only it weren't for those last five minutes which try to be reflective and thoughtful but instead come off as a ridiculously forced conclusion. In retrospect I realize that the resolution has it's intended purposes, but I still can't help but feel like the authors wrote themselves into a corner that they inevitably had to cheat their way out of.
The acting is good, so good in fact I almost hate to give this picture a negative review, but it does little to salvage a scattered plot. Hackman's thoroughly impressive in the way he allows Henry to be torn down without compromise, never allowing his ego to get in the way of the story, though he probably should have. Freeman is equally good, proving once again that he can play just about any part he so desires.
And the directing's beyond reproach. Hopkins makes clever use of the camera, allowing the audience to become a part of the story as he tells it. He's very liberal with flashbacks, permitting the questioning parties (Freeman & Jane) to intrude on the moments as Henry's reliving them. This is about as creative as movies get, which is quite impressive but only makes me dislike the film even more. The fact that such highly original moments are wasted on a plot that's going nowhere only serves to make the finished product more distressing.
If you missed this one in theatres you're not alone. It was barely released stateside, which should give you an idea of just how awful the ending truly is. A real disappointment.
Movie Review: like an escalator that goes nowhere....
Summary: 2 Stars
I first caught this movie by chance on the Bravo network. It seemed like it had the makings of a great film, and Freeman and Hackman do a fabulous job. Although it can at times drag on, due largely in part to the permanent setting of the police office, the dialogue and dynamic between Freemand and Hackman is intense and engrossing. I was really looking forward to the ending, as the plot up until that point kept building up the suspense and had me asking a million questions. Then it happened, and it made no sense. Hackman's character confesses to a murder he didn't committ and a lot of other stuff happens that makes no sense. Right after watching it I got on the internet to see if somewhere somebody could explain what the heck the ending was about, and all I found was dozens of other people as confused as I was. Some sites mentioned that the director said that the whole reason Hackman's character confesses to a rape/murder he didn't committ was because he couldn't stand to live if his wife really thought he was such a monster. That explains a little, but there are still huge holes. So if he didn't do it who did? Some random guy who is never identified is hauled into the station and it is clear that he is the murderer, but it also seems like the wife had something to do with it, possibly to frame her husband and also maybe because she was upset when she saw him laughing and talking with his young niece. But really, is that reason enough to try and frame him as a perverted murderer? And if it was all her idea, then why does she seem so shocked by everything?
My best guess is that she wanted to divorce him because they were in a loveless marriage, and she was sick of him lusting after young girls, but she couldn't just have a regular divorce because he husband was a powerful man and it would have been a mess. At the same time she had a feeling (and she was correct) that her husband had a fasciantion with young girls, so I guess she got in cahoots with some murderer and planted all this evidence to incriminate her husband so she could divorce him easily. Thats why he says at one point "I can't believe she would go to all this trouble to make a point", he knows what she is doing, she is framing him because she is bitter, neglected and whats a divorce, and he know it. He gives in and says he did it because he doesn't want to deal with her anymore, and realizes for the first time that she really hates him and would go to extreme lengths because she really thinks he is a monster. It might also be because he knows that he is sick and perhaps he feels guilty.
I love a movie that makes you think, but the ending of this one forces the viewers to completely invent a reason for the ending because there are no explanations that actually exist in the plot.