"Dead in the Water" plays like a fine episode of "Columbo". Right from the start we know the murder's identity, and the fun is watching the guilty party's perfect murder slowly unravel. The acting by all is very good, and the deliberate pace lends itself to strong character development. Since none of the characters is likable, and their motives all self serving, the intermingled black humor is quite welcome. Special mention must be made of the musical score, and opening credits sequence, which are both top notch. You could do far worse for an evenings entertainment than "Dead in the Water. I recommend taking a look at this one. - MERK
6 Reviews
Terrible in every way
nicholls_les2 September 2015
Warning: Spoilers
This is a really bad film, I watched it to the end just to see what happens but then felt I had wasted a couple of hours of my life on this dross. Bryan Brown acting is worse than a child in a nativity play. At times he over acts and at other times seems more wooden than his office desk. Terri Hatcher is the only thing worth watching this for, simply for her beauty.
The plot is just plain silly, the guy is supposed to be a pretty good lawyer but his plot to get rid of his wife had more holes than a packet of Polo's.
He plans to murder his wife and to cover his tracks has an affair with a friend of his wife. Which any lawyer would have seen as motive to murder his wife. His so called Alibi was also silly. He takes his wife to a remote place, books in so the lodge owners see him and his wife, then he kills her and makes sure they see him and only him drive away. His genius is letting Terri Hatcher pretend to be his wife (even though she looks not even remotely like the wife) It all falls apart when the secretary (who was married all along to a criminal), herself gets killed by her husband. Then the woman brown had the fling with reveals that she knows he killed his wife and won't let him go, she has power to help him become a judge. To cap it all his wife had changed her will and left the murdering husband nothing. So a lawyer who can't plan a murder. That's about the film. Badly acted, directed and a woolly script. Give this film a miss.
The plot is just plain silly, the guy is supposed to be a pretty good lawyer but his plot to get rid of his wife had more holes than a packet of Polo's.
He plans to murder his wife and to cover his tracks has an affair with a friend of his wife. Which any lawyer would have seen as motive to murder his wife. His so called Alibi was also silly. He takes his wife to a remote place, books in so the lodge owners see him and his wife, then he kills her and makes sure they see him and only him drive away. His genius is letting Terri Hatcher pretend to be his wife (even though she looks not even remotely like the wife) It all falls apart when the secretary (who was married all along to a criminal), herself gets killed by her husband. Then the woman brown had the fling with reveals that she knows he killed his wife and won't let him go, she has power to help him become a judge. To cap it all his wife had changed her will and left the murdering husband nothing. So a lawyer who can't plan a murder. That's about the film. Badly acted, directed and a woolly script. Give this film a miss.
NOIR NOVEL CONVERSION, WITH HIGH STYLE.
rsoonsa9 July 2004
Harry Whittington, author of over 200 novels during a lengthy career, with "Web Of Murder" the noirish thriller upon which this film is based appearing in 1958, is widely recognized as one of the more skillful plotmasters within the field of crime fiction and this production adheres to the basic structure of the original. The work is replete with wit, although the majority is not found within the mildly disjunctive scenario or from the, at times, somewhat languid direction of canny Bill Condon, but instead is centered within the moodily clever lighting and camerawork under supervision of Ron Murphy, along with the creative and droll costumes of Grania Preston. Murphy's fellow Australian Bryan Brown capably portrays Charlie Deegan, a rather unsavoury American defense attorney in love with his secretary Laura (Teri Hatcher), and conspires with her to murder his moneyed wife whom he detests, but as we must expect from a cinematic crime of passion, dire complications ensue after there is no turning back. Whittington's novel, of the hard boiled genre, whisks along at a fevered pace whereas this picture, utilizing a voiceover track of Brown, is more leisurely yet still quite enjoyable largely due to its sharp casting from top to bottom with only the aesthetic exceptions of Anne DeSalvo and Veronica Cartwright, each next to impossible to make as undesirable as their characters are in the book. Cartwright gathers in the acting laurels here with her feral performance as Deegan's fly in the ointment, with Hatcher's prototype from the mystery novel being far more aggressive than is the actress in a role that, after all, depicts murder for profit, while top-flight supporting turns come from Pruitt Taylor Vince, Ron Karabatsos, Anna Thomson and Brent Hinkley; additionally notable are the splendid sets of Jim Adams, art design by Richard Sherman and a wry thematic score by Philip Giffin, all complementing the visual concepts of the cinematography, while one shall not overlook the extraordinary opening credits, employing a spider and a hapless fly (come into my parlour....), highlighted by excellent sound mixing for this stylish and generally overlooked film.
In planning to get away with murder you have to reckon with complications, which is the point they always miss.
clanciai23 December 2018
Someone wrote a review with the conclusion that this was terrible in every way, and of course it is, but there is more to it than that. First of all, Bryan Brown is like an Australian Michael Caine, and this would have been a superb part for Michael Caine, as he would have added even more subtility like food for afterhought to it. His case is precarious indeed, as he, although a terribly clever attourney and expert on any way of crime, fails to have learred there is no perfect crime. Still he plans it and thinks he will get away with it, which makes him nothing less than a goof. But that's the intrigue.
There are some women around him, his wife for one, a terrible nightmare of a shrew, and then that secretary, who is only good for sex and carrying around a dark secret to add a bitter aftertaste and aftermath when the time comes, and then there is that terribly vulgar Victoria, whom you learn to hate as much as he does from the beginning, who just wants to eat him up and does it.
It's a noir, but actually a dark humour noir, the twist to the tale is overwhelming in its marvellous way of turning everything the other way and upside down and topsy-turvy, so that the candidates for his murder list tend to multiply for good reasons, resulting in more murders than anyone had bargained for with some serious gunfire as well. You can't have everything, which Bryan Brown evidently thought he could and therefore made a go for it - and gained much more than he ever could have dreamt of, but only for worse, for no good at all, and that's the karmic lesson of this loathsome morality of the wrong people all doing the wrong things.
There are some women around him, his wife for one, a terrible nightmare of a shrew, and then that secretary, who is only good for sex and carrying around a dark secret to add a bitter aftertaste and aftermath when the time comes, and then there is that terribly vulgar Victoria, whom you learn to hate as much as he does from the beginning, who just wants to eat him up and does it.
It's a noir, but actually a dark humour noir, the twist to the tale is overwhelming in its marvellous way of turning everything the other way and upside down and topsy-turvy, so that the candidates for his murder list tend to multiply for good reasons, resulting in more murders than anyone had bargained for with some serious gunfire as well. You can't have everything, which Bryan Brown evidently thought he could and therefore made a go for it - and gained much more than he ever could have dreamt of, but only for worse, for no good at all, and that's the karmic lesson of this loathsome morality of the wrong people all doing the wrong things.
Thriller with plenty of life
tomsview19 January 2014
Warning: Spoilers
Some sequences in "Dead in the Water" are reminiscent of a number of movies: "Double Indemnity", "A Place in the Sun", "The Grifters" and even Dennis Hopper's "The Hot Spot", but you hardly notice the déjà vu because everything is so perfectly put together in this witty, clever thriller.
Charlie Deegan, played by Aussie actor, Bryan Brown, has married the wealthy Olivia, played by Anne De Salvo. Although Charlie had the choice of hiring a secretary with 'great typing skills but bad legs', he instead hired Laura Stewart, played by Terri Hatcher, and as he says, "Before Laura, I had never been one to stay late at the office". Although he realises that "...the smart thing to do would be to fire her", he adds knowingly, "Nobody is that smart".
Eventually, Charlie wants out of his marriage to be with Laura – but wants to keep all the money and realise his ambition of becoming a judge as well – it's a problem that can only really be resolved with the murder of his wife.
To cover his tracks, the plan involves Charlie having an affair with Victoria, played by Veronica Cartwright, a friend of his wife whom he despises. However, she proves to be far wilier and more ambitious than he is. Between her and Frank Vaness, an astute detective played by Seymour Cassel, his plans come unstuck at just about every turn.
Bryan Brown may not be a producer's first choice for Richard III, but in a role that calls for a little villainy tempered with a wry sense of humour, he is your man. Charlie narrates the film, and it works beautifully thanks to a witty script. His Australian background is dealt with in an exchange with his wife when she reminds him that if it weren't for her father, he would "...still be wading through sheep dip at a billabong barbecue". Weird, but it sort of sounds Australian.
Terri Hatcher gives new meaning to the words femme fatale in this film. "Dead in the Water" was made in that period before "Desperate Housewives" when she played a succession of what seemed like supporting roles in a number of movies where, with the exception of "2 Days in the Valley", the filmmakers didn't seem to know what to do with her. Not here though; the filmmakers appreciated what they had, and gave her a role that suited that stunning beauty and presence that makes it easy to believe why Charlie is ready to risk everything.
The film has a look, with great use of shadows. It has a good score with a light jazzy theme, which transitions to more ominous tones as the tension builds. The film walks the line between light and dark and doesn't shrink back from a shock or two – it also has some genuinely surprising twists.
"Dead in the Water" works on just about every level; it's a sleeper that's definitely worth seeking out.
Charlie Deegan, played by Aussie actor, Bryan Brown, has married the wealthy Olivia, played by Anne De Salvo. Although Charlie had the choice of hiring a secretary with 'great typing skills but bad legs', he instead hired Laura Stewart, played by Terri Hatcher, and as he says, "Before Laura, I had never been one to stay late at the office". Although he realises that "...the smart thing to do would be to fire her", he adds knowingly, "Nobody is that smart".
Eventually, Charlie wants out of his marriage to be with Laura – but wants to keep all the money and realise his ambition of becoming a judge as well – it's a problem that can only really be resolved with the murder of his wife.
To cover his tracks, the plan involves Charlie having an affair with Victoria, played by Veronica Cartwright, a friend of his wife whom he despises. However, she proves to be far wilier and more ambitious than he is. Between her and Frank Vaness, an astute detective played by Seymour Cassel, his plans come unstuck at just about every turn.
Bryan Brown may not be a producer's first choice for Richard III, but in a role that calls for a little villainy tempered with a wry sense of humour, he is your man. Charlie narrates the film, and it works beautifully thanks to a witty script. His Australian background is dealt with in an exchange with his wife when she reminds him that if it weren't for her father, he would "...still be wading through sheep dip at a billabong barbecue". Weird, but it sort of sounds Australian.
Terri Hatcher gives new meaning to the words femme fatale in this film. "Dead in the Water" was made in that period before "Desperate Housewives" when she played a succession of what seemed like supporting roles in a number of movies where, with the exception of "2 Days in the Valley", the filmmakers didn't seem to know what to do with her. Not here though; the filmmakers appreciated what they had, and gave her a role that suited that stunning beauty and presence that makes it easy to believe why Charlie is ready to risk everything.
The film has a look, with great use of shadows. It has a good score with a light jazzy theme, which transitions to more ominous tones as the tension builds. The film walks the line between light and dark and doesn't shrink back from a shock or two – it also has some genuinely surprising twists.
"Dead in the Water" works on just about every level; it's a sleeper that's definitely worth seeking out.
It's entertaining!
RodrigAndrisan21 October 2021
Not so bad like one guy wrote. Indeed, Teri Hatcher is very young and beautiful. And she even acts well. Like all those others in the cast, Bryan Brown (please, don't compare him with Michael Caine, Michael Caine should have done something else than acting...), Anne De Salvo, excellent in the role of the unbearable wife, Veronica Cartwright excellent in the role of the alleged unbearable mistress, Seymour Cassel, very good as the intelligent cop. You got to have a little intelligence yourself to understand the tone and the real intent of this film, it's obviously a parody of crime movies, and it shouldn't be taken seriously as such. And, by the way, there is no perfect crime, neither in
movies nor in real life. Except if you kill some flies, mosquitoes or cockroaches.
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