If Eyes of Laura Mars was Italian it would be a giallo. Set in the fashion world, it features a gloved killer using an ice pick to bump off the friends and colleagues of controversial photographer Laura Mars (Faye Dunaway), who can 'see' the murders in her mind as they happen. Cop John Neville (Tommy Lee Jones) tries to catch the killer, falling in love with Laura in the process.
Of course, if the film was Italian, it would probably be a lot more stylish, Irvin Kershner's direction lacking the visual flair of many of his Euro-counterparts, the murders in particular being devoid of panache (and gore!). And the soundtrack would be less disco and more jazz. But that's not to say that the film isn't worth a watch: from an original script by John Carpenter, just before his major hit Halloween, the film benefits from engaging turns from a quality cast that also includes Brad Dourif as ex-con Tommy, Raul Julia as Laura's waste-of-space ex-husband Michael, and Rene Auberjonois as Laura's agent Donald, all of whom help make this a fun little murder mystery, even if the mystery isn't that hard to solve...
Dourif is obviously a red-herring, too shifty to be the killer; ditto for Julia. Auberjonois is stabbed to death in a hilarious case of mistaken identity, so that rules him out. That leaves one major character-Tommy Lee Jones's cop-to be the ice-pick killer, which would be ridiculous. But hey, this is a giallo, and ridiculous is the name of the game. In the final act, Lt. Neville reveals himself to be schizophrenic, part good guy, part looney tunes psycho angry about Laura's controversial work. Smashing his way into Laura's very brown apartment, the good part of Neville's fractured psyche begs for Laura to kill him...
6.5/10, rounded up to 7 for Jones's monobrow and Auberjonois' hair.
Of course, if the film was Italian, it would probably be a lot more stylish, Irvin Kershner's direction lacking the visual flair of many of his Euro-counterparts, the murders in particular being devoid of panache (and gore!). And the soundtrack would be less disco and more jazz. But that's not to say that the film isn't worth a watch: from an original script by John Carpenter, just before his major hit Halloween, the film benefits from engaging turns from a quality cast that also includes Brad Dourif as ex-con Tommy, Raul Julia as Laura's waste-of-space ex-husband Michael, and Rene Auberjonois as Laura's agent Donald, all of whom help make this a fun little murder mystery, even if the mystery isn't that hard to solve...
Dourif is obviously a red-herring, too shifty to be the killer; ditto for Julia. Auberjonois is stabbed to death in a hilarious case of mistaken identity, so that rules him out. That leaves one major character-Tommy Lee Jones's cop-to be the ice-pick killer, which would be ridiculous. But hey, this is a giallo, and ridiculous is the name of the game. In the final act, Lt. Neville reveals himself to be schizophrenic, part good guy, part looney tunes psycho angry about Laura's controversial work. Smashing his way into Laura's very brown apartment, the good part of Neville's fractured psyche begs for Laura to kill him...
6.5/10, rounded up to 7 for Jones's monobrow and Auberjonois' hair.