Deceived

Paradoxically, this would be a pretty good little thriller if it didn’t have any charactersor, rather, if it did have some characters who weren’t strictly slaves to the thriller mechanics. Instead, it starts off with characters and winds up with some rather effective jolts that make them evaporate. We begin with Goldie Hawn happily married to John Heard; what happens after that is best left to screenwriters Mary Agnes Donoghue and Derek Saunders; Damian Harris directed, and Ashley Peldon, Robin Bartlett, Tom Irwin, and Amy Wright costar. (JR) Read more

Crossing The Line

David Leland’s The Big Mansubstantially recut, as is their wont, by Miramax, who always know what’s best for us. Not having seen the original, I can’t vouch for what this violent British thrillerabout an unemployed Scottish miner who is recruited by a gangster and exploited as an illegal bare-knuckle boxerwas originally like. In its present form, it comes across as a rather unpleasant and only fitfully absorbing film of social protest. Don McPherson wrote the script; with Liam Neeson, Joanne Whalley-Kilmer, Ian Bannen, and Billy Connolly (1990). (JR) Read more