Change Your Image
miditracs
Reviews
Under Suspicion (2000)
Puts me in mind of SE7EN...
Like SE7EN there is weird (albeit appropriate) music. Like SE7EN there is a jumpy, ADD-inflected title sequence. Like SE7EN this film is dark and dreary, a vision of an ill-lit and illicit milieu, raising far more questions than it answers. And Morgan Freeman is playing yet another world-weary detective, swamped by serial killings. There is even a young, hot-headed cop involved, although Thomas Jane (Detective Owens) is certainly no Brad Pitt. He was so grating in his part that I kept wishing he would get off the screen so the two leads could get at it.
And so they do. If in their last appearance together in UNFORGIVEN Hackman's character was tormenting Freeman's, then it is somehow fitting that here it is the latter's Capt. Victor Benezet who interrogates, berates, persecutes and ultimately breaks down the resistance of Hackman's Henry Hearst, an attorney who verily has a fool for a client. Capt. Benezet may position himself as the 'good' cop in the 'good cop/bad cop' scenarios he sets up with Detective Owens, and later, Detective Castillo (Pablo Cunqueiro); but he is ever questioning, ever probing, ever seeking in his interrogations the heart of this dark matter. He is even insinuated into his witnesses' recollections, through a cool cinematographic trick appearing and asking questions in situ in the midst of the film's flashbacks.
In spite of interruptions from underlings, superiors, and ultimately Hearst's spouse Chantal (Monica Bellucci in a tight, controlled performance) , over the course of the film one by one the lies and half-truths are stripped away, leaving Hearst with only his moral turpitude and his pitifully sparse self-justifications intact. It is only another interruption from one of Benezet's people that jerks us away from the sleazy, soul-shorn sight. Yet the revelation that follows twists and tears, sending our belief in this story and its implications into a dizzying, perhaps fatal spin.
In the ending sequence Chantal and Henry Hearst walk towards each other, but somehow do not connect. They end up sitting apart. In a way that relates to the way UNDER SUSPICION acts upon its viewers. Sorry, no neat, happy ending here. Not even a coherent one.
Nurse Betty (2000)
My Morgan-centric review of "Nurse Betty"
First of all, some have called this film a 'black comedy'. NURSE BETTY is NOT a comedy; it is farce. One in which serious themes such as violence, betrayal and killing are taken very lightly. Think not 'Dogma' or 'Pillow Talk' but rather 'Throw Momma From the Train'. This kind of dark humor has probably put more than one critic off the film, but if you understand the nature of the genre you can see past it and laugh at the absurdities. And absurdities abound. When we first see Renée Zellweger's character, Betty, she is nice and sweet to the point of unreality. Everybody ignores or takes advantage of her. In short, she is a doormat, and would be unbelievable, were it not for the fact that I have seen a few "Bettys" in my time. She is a type of holy fool, consecrated to the cult of soap's A REASON TO LOVE'S Dr. David Ravell. And when in the face of trauma and death she goes round the bend, she embarks on a pilgrimage from Kansas to L.A. to seek out her icon. Greg Kinnear's performance as Dr. Ravell/George McCord, the idol with feet of all-too-human clay, hits just the right notes of Hollywood insincerity and smarminess, reflecting the desperation of an almost has-been actor who would consider anything to avoid the specter of his soap character being killed off. And we see Freeman's character Charlie in his devotions, carrying around, talking to and fussing over photos of Betty as if they were holy relics.
Morgan Freeman's performance in this film is pure pleasure, akin to seeing a Frank Lloyd Wright house, tasting and enjoying the bouquet of a fine wine vintage or listening to the smoky vocals of Ray Charles or Macy Gray. Whether admiring Betty's wedding picture, reading aloud to Wesley from her diary, contemplating her image as they chase her cross-country in the car or stalking her outside the apartment where she is staying, he fills out his role of the hitman Charlie with unexpected dimensions. In past interviews MF has expressed a longing to expand past his usual "staid and dignified" typecasting, and here he finally gets to do it. Ironically, though he could receive a fourth Oscar nomination for this part, he probably won't win it. It would be only be for Best Supporting Actor, anyway... With Betty (once jerky, dismissive husband Del is put out of the way) and Kinnear's Dr. Ravell/George McCord these three characters focus the movie. Each one of them suffers from misdirected devotion: once Betty's eyes are finally opened she realizes it as she listens to Charlie describing himself to her as if he were writing a lovelorn personals ad. In response she gently tells him, "I don't think I'm who you think I am." And in one scene with the soap star she quotes a friend who once told her "if he were any handsomer it'd be a crime", then in the next breath with an earthy if astute observation of his character proceeds to demolish his actor's ego, shattering the last of the illusions he has accumulated in the course of his involvement with her. In all this, Chris Rock's Wesley doesn't fit in. He is the odd man out in this triangle; he kicks against its edges, but does little more than inflict various dings to its sides. But the one real damage we see him do early in the film is enough to precipitate the whole mad chase. Think of his character as the fulcrum that sets this unbalanced object rolling. He and Charlie are an oddly matched pair. As father-son the two actors pull it off, Rock's raunchy raucous comedic talent and MF's steady, centered presence balancing and complementing one another. There is one very funny moment where Charlie hauls Wesley's struggling form out of an office, as if corralling a tantrumming five-year-old. There is another more telling scene, however, where the family dynamic is suddenly reversed: Wesley rebukes his dad's fantasizing, telling him in effect that he won't stand for it. It matters not that Wesley is addicted to A REASON TO LOVE and has a case of the hots for the actress playing Jasmine; that does not begin to match the level of obsession involved in Charlie's cherishing and taping back together a snapshot of Betty that his son had torn and scattered in a fit of pique. Charlie and Wesley may be related, but as in most families, the two are real opposites: son Wesley is outwardly charming but boiling over with rage and violence inside (like the character "Mouse" in DEVIL IN A BLUE DRESS, or, more interestingly, one of Freeman's past roles, the Times Square pimp "Fast Black" in STREET SMART). On the other hand, his father Charlie in his capacity as a professional hitman has been there and seen enough to keep his belligerence firmly on the outside: often he will take someone roughly in hand, then in soothing tones tell them something like "you haven't been forthcoming to us." Neil LaBute seems to have handled his directing duties well. The casting of the leads is superb, he lets each do what they do best, and there is enough light shining through the cinematography (and the story) to avoid the charges of claustrophobic film-making that were lodged against his prior projects. At times the pacing seemed uneven, a little slow, particularly in the first 45 minutes of the film. Indeed it seemes that it gets faster and faster the further one gets into the film; perhaps cutting back and forth too quickly in the last, most important scenes. Also, a few story points seemed truncated or edited out, such as Charlie's fantasy sequence with Betty (they kiss, but not dance? And if so, why does Wesley deride his father later for dancing alone in the dark?) and the subplot involving Fair Oaks' sheriff and newspaperman. In NURSE BETTY there is not only idealization of the central character, the soap star and the fantasy milieu of Hollywood but also of time. Throughout the film there are harkenings back to a simpler era: several visual cues relating Betty to Dorothy in Wizard of Oz (check out her waitress uniform and her garb in the fantasy with Charlie) the mention of Doris Day, the old car Charlie and Wesley drive in, break down, then have repaired again. And if Betty is a Dorothy in search of self-fulfillment, then in some sense Charlie is the Wizard, the man behind the curtain. In the denouement he in essence tells her that she needs no hero; that in herself she has the heart, the brains and the courage to make her way in the world on her own. And that makes that last chaste, real kiss he bestows on her cheek almost a benediction.