Category: Crime Drama

ANATOMY OF A MURDER

By Marc S. Sanders

I’m a sucker for courtroom theatrics and Otto Preminger’s Anatomy Of A Murder is no exception.  Though it is sorely out of date when most of today’s viewing audiences have at least one Law & Order episode under their belt. Preminger’s film, adapted from the novel by Robert Traver and inspired by a real-life upstate Michigan homicide, hinged on taboo language and heinous motives enabled by revenge.  Even the father of leading man, James Stewart, found this film to be entirely offensive and campaigned for audiences to avoid seeing it.

Army Lieutenant Frederick Manion (Ben Gazarra) is on trial for the murder of an innkeeper he believed raped and abused his promiscuous wife, Laura (Lee Remick).  Good ol’ boy lawyer Paul Biegler is the former prosecuting attorney of this small Michigan town who opts to represent the defendant.  This will be Paul’s first trial on the other side of the courtroom, and he recruits his best friend and colleague to help him, a washed-up lawyer and lovable drunk named Parnell (Arthur O’Connell).  Paul’s strategy is to defend his client with a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity because Manion is adamant he has no recollection of killing the victim with five gunshot wounds. 

Anatomy Of A Murder is easy to follow because it does not have a wealth of variables to twist the narrative in different directions.  The interest works on Stewart’s Capra-influenced likability.  George Bailey becomes a lawyer. The actor is older by this point in his career, and this performance would be his last Oscar nomination.  He’s sharp in the role and quick on his feet with objections and standard trial ligations.  He’s also adorably charming as he crafts fishhooks at the table while a witness is being questioned by opposing counsel.  That was a first for me to observe.

The prosecution has its small-time attorney, Mitch Lodwick, played with mustache-adorned, nerdy conservatism by Brooks West.  However, a big metropolitan lawyer sits next to him.  George C Scott might be early in his career here, with black slicked hair and dark suits as the imminent Claude Dancer, who notoriously arrives from Lansing, Michigan. He’s reputably intimidating and altogether sly.  He hardly says a word during the first third of his performance and his silence is impossible to ignore. However, when he takes lead counsel later in the story, Scott demonstrates that he’s the standout element of the picture.

Anatomy Of A Murder relies on the taboo nature of the crime on trial.  A rape of his wife motivates a suspect to kill.  In any circumstance, that is going to necessitate a discussion on the subject of ladies’ undergarments.  With a sidebar committee consisting of Stewart, West and Scott with the sleepy, elderly Judge Weaver (Joseph N Welch, famously part of the McCarthy hearings), the script includes time to debate how best to describe Laura Manion’s panties by going so far as to ask if there’s a more suitable word for “panties.”  The men are stumped and the Judge draws a line in the sand by declaring to the courtroom that any sort of chortling will not be tolerated.

In 1959, it’s unheard of to tarnish a person’s ears with vocabulary that includes “sperm,” “intercourse,” “penetration,” “climax,” “rape,” “panties,” “girdle,” and “bitch.”  Yikes!  My friend Anthony and I watched the Criterion Blu Ray of Preminger’s film, nominated for Best Picture, Screenplay and a trio of actors (Stewart, Scott and O’Connell) and we did our best to put our perspective in the past, before our time when Father Knows Best occupied television sets.  Yes.  It was likely shocking with a lot of gall to pull away the veil of sexual deviancy.  An intoxicated Lee Remick is no Donna Reed as she struts around in tight pants and low-cut blouses with a pair of sporty sunglasses.  On the stand, she describes her panties as either being white or pink with lace down the side and ripped off during her alleged assault.  Later, Jimmy Stewart is holding the evidence in clear view.  It couldn’t be anything but shocking.  Turn on any program today, and you’re apt to find any of this conjecture within an episode of Friends or Modern Family. Still, ‘the fella who spoke to Harvey the rabbit is fondling women’s underpants in a courtroom for everyone to see? For shame.

Laura Manion is also tested on the witness stand by Mr. Dancer when she declares she swore on a set of rosary beads. The attorney questions her faith with the Catholic church and if she is worthy of identifying herself as a Catholic any longer. Another person reveals being born out of wedlock. Something that no one should ever know. Religious conservatism tests the merits of its witnesses. In 1959, to say you swore on a set of rosary beads is not taken lightly. To be known as a bastard child is a social crime. Today, it’s just a phrase as common as saying “I swear on my children…” or you are just raised in a single parent home. The servitude of Anatomy Of A Murder has changed over decades of different generations when many are not so protective their personal sensibilities. The age of internet browsing allows everyone to be much more revealing in beliefs or lack thereof, and what constitutes as sexual appeal or how you originated.

Beyond the coarse language and subject matter of Anatomy Of A Murder, there’s not much here that feels fresh or pioneering any longer.  Today’s audiences are far too sophisticated for what Preminger was brash enough to originally show on screen. Anthony and I were certain that Laura’s adorable shaggy dog and a gold cigarette lighter that resurfaces a few times would lynchpin inevitable twists in the case.  Alas, it was just a dog, and alas it was just a lighter.  Yet, the attention to these items seemed like apparent invitations to significant developments.  

Actually, the one surprise that comes from the film is regrettably revealed too soon.  A material witness is disclosed midway through the picture.  However, when George C Scott questions this individual on the stand towards the end of movie, his character is the only one in the room who doesn’t know anything about this person.  With the audience already in on it, what is left to learn except to watch Scott’s character stand apart from everyone else? Had Anatomy Of A Murder been made today, the big reveal would have occurred in the courtroom for all to be surprised and intrigued.  Sidney Lumet’s The Verdict did that. Unfortunately, this is a terribly unfortunate misstep in execution.  It even takes away from Scott’s sensationally devious performance while sucking out potential dramatic heights.

As Paul waits for the jury to return with its verdict, Parnell ponders the dynamics of twelve strangers coming together to determine the fate of an accused.  It’s as if no one ever heard of a jury before this film was released.  Surely audiences, on the cusp of Perry Mason with Agatha Christie at the local library, were somewhat familiar with juries and judicial proceedings.  Anatomy Of A Murder is so simplified that it’s hard to embrace how heinous its evidence and testimonials should be.  

However, Jimmy Stewart performs like Andy Griffith’s famous characters, from Mayberry and Matlock.  The fella loves to fish and sit with his friend Parnell as they joyously read law books well into the night.  If a trial comes along, he might take it if he’s up for it. This guy is just so relaxed with himself and his practice which amonts to hardly any business and income as his faithful secretary, Maida (Eve Arden) reminds him for the run along relatable humor of the piece. Oh Maida, there you go again. Ribbing Paul all along!

Anatomy Of A Murder serves as a lookback to when movies were shedding their innocent, whitewashed skin. It anticipates that audiences will accept heinous crime and sexual deviancy. Otto Preminger trusts America’s favorite actor, Jimmy Stewart, to deliver. Lee Remick stands as an influence for those overly sexualized roles that Sharon Stone and Demi Moore would occupy thirty years later.

Preminger’s film has a widely recognized reputation with a bestowed ten Oscar nominations (though not including Otto Preminger). AFI ranks it as one of the top ten courtroom dramas, in the company 12 Angry Men and Judgment At Nuremberg. Criterion has a print edition within its library. Yet, seventy years after its introduction the temperature of the film is lukewarm, and the subjects are not so jaw dropping. As well, at nearly three hours running time, it could stand to have edited out so much irrelevant material that slows down the story and lends nothing to its characters.

Anatomy Of A Murder is upheld by its formula which I’d argue has been significantly more enhanced and leaner in movies to come, which drew from its inspiration. This is an anatomy of a courtroom crime drama, in its most basic form, when unmentionables might have been mentioned for the first time. I’m glad I didn’t die of embarrassment in front of Anthony. I mean I’ve heard of intercourse and I’ve seen women in girdles in a Glamour magazine (like George Costanza) before, and at the very least I’ve seen women’s panties on sale at Macy’s. If you have as well, then you are likely ready for Anatomy Of A Murder.

TO DIE FOR

By Marc S. Sanders

Gus Van Sant’s To Die For has to be one of the most wickedly delicious satires of the last thirty years.  Buck Henry adapts Joyce Maynard’s novel that takes a bite out of the juicy apple that savors fame and popularity.  Nicole Kidman delivers my favorite performance of her extensive career with one of the few comedies on her resume.  The film stands the test of time because in an age of social media influence and YouTube stardom, it perfectly reflects the vanity that our modern cultures strive to uphold.  It’s a proud demonstration of exaggerated egotism.

Kidman portrays Suzanne Stone, a peach of a preppy gal who costumes herself in candy colored business suits and wardrobes.  Suzanne aspires to become the next Jane Pauley, minus the flab or Connie Pauvich – sorry Chung, Connie Chung.  Therefore, she’ll stick with Suzanne Stone and not her married name Suzanne Maretto, adopted following her nuptials to her sweetheart of a guy, Larry (Matt Dillon). Maretto does not have the roll of the tongue stage name that the alliterative SS of Susan Stone provides. Larry is a sweet and naive guy who helps run his Italian family’s restaurant with mom and dad (Dan Hedaya, Maria Tucci) and sister, Janice (Illeana Douglas, always an amazing character actress, normally in smaller roles than what she offers here.)

Suzanne’s rise to the top has to start somewhere in the small hometown of Little Hope, New Hampshire.  So, it’s best to seek out an opportunity at the local public access TV station run by Ed Grant (Wayne Knight) delivering magnificent facial expressions of puzzlement and uncertainty in response to Suzanne’s onslaught of ideas and suggestions.  Eventually, Ed surrenders to Suzanne and gives her a short section at 9:00 PM to deliver the weather report complete with cardboard cutouts of the sun, and clouds.  Her mom, dad and sister (Holland Taylor, Kurtwood Smith, Susan Traylor) are gleefully proud to watch from the comfort of their home.  So are Larry and his folks.  Janice is suspicious and concerned, though. 

When Suzanne recruits three burnout high school students, Jimmy, Lydia and Russel, (Joaquin Phoenix, Allison Foland, Casey Affleck) for a documentary project, things may become murderous as a means to fuel the engine of ambition.

Buck Henry’s script outline works partially as a documentary.  Between staged scenes among all of the characters, the perfectly coifed Suzanne is speaking directly towards the camera eager to share everything that’s wonderful about her.  She does offer a moment to shed a tear for her dearly departed Larry though, but the chin quickly pops back up and the white teeth shine between the pinky lip gloss. 

Caught while casually ice skating at the Little Hope rink, Janice reflects on Suzanne’s short marriage to her brother.  Jimmy is dressed in a prison jumpsuit, with a mop in hand and a buzzcut while offering a perplexed recollection of his time with her.  Poor white trash Lydia reminisces about her fondness for Suzanne.  This “starlet” of the public access airwaves with a perfect figure, and a glistening smile with a saccharine sweet inflection in her voice had an impact on all of these people.  Both sides of the family go on a daytime talk show to share their points of view.  Suzanne’s dad was especially concerned about his little girl marrying Larry because his family feels like an extension of the mafia.  By the way, dad opposite dad, Kurtwood Smith vs Dan Hedaya, is casting brilliance.

Shortly after Suzanne begins speaking directly to me, I cannot help but think about Erica Kirk, Charlie Kirk’s widow, who bravely headlined speaking engagements in front of tens of thousands of people, dressed in the finest glittered outfits with the perfect shades of blush, mascara and lipstick and every strand of hair perfectly in place.  She has notoriously been questioned if her grief for her assassinated husband is genuine.  Regardless of where your politics stand or how you regarded Charlie Kirk, there’s no denying the false advertising of Erica’s anguish amidst the pompous display of fireworks and showmanship in the aftermath of her husband’s violent death.  Suzanne Stone is unquestionably the precursor to, former fashion model, now mother of three, Erica Kirk’s campaign to stay relevant.  It’s uncanny, and Joyce Maynard’s character invention is a very frank reflection of people’s yearning to be known above all the rest. 

With news cameras present at Larry’s gravesite funeral and then on the steps of the courthouse, there is Suzanne ready to speak directly to the camera, adorned in her Easter pastel colored best, ready to declare her innocence and sorrow after she’s considered suspect number one in Larry’s unexpected murder.  How the crime is carried out is salacious beyond just another burglarized home shooting.  For Suzanne, however, it’s perfect fodder for showmanship.  Suzanne is much more interesting as a murder suspect than a cutesy weather girl in a mini skirt and high heels.

Gus Van Sant recruited composer Danny Elfman to score the film and while his easily recognizable notes and chorus harmonies sound like they have been pulled from his other works in Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands, it works as the most appropriate accompaniment over the opening credits that play over a series of front-page newspaper articles.  Much of the exposition is covered by quickly glancing over these headlines that imply something sinister has occurred with this “pure as the driven snow” young girl and her newlywed husband whose worst mistake was to fall head over heels in love at first site.

Buck Henry echoes some themes of a May/December seduction that sent The Graduate into the pop culture stratosphere to amplify the shocking drama of crime in a small town.  The aftereffects are altogether different in To Die For, though.  Beyond Suzanne’s immediate family, most adults can see right through her act.  On the other hand, Larry, along with the three high school students, are susceptible to her conniving web.  Suzanne knows just how to pull at the heartstrings. 

In a YouTube world, Suzanne Stone would be at the very top of the food chain.  No one would be able match her.  Nicole Kidman is masterful at her timing.  She’s hypnotizing with her assertiveness and confidence.  She may not have a journalism major, but Suzanne Stone believes she has the skills and assets to dethrone the Barbara Walters of the world. 

Like Paddy Chayefsky’s Network appears uncannily prophetic, To Die For equally has achieved that plateau.  I recently watched a Netflix documentary called The Crash that focuses on a social media addict who was found guilty for killing her boyfriend and a friend after crashing her car into a brick wall.  It was not challenging to determine that the act was certainly intentional and the egotistical young girl was sentenced to fifteen years to life in prison.  Now, the debate rages about how much is this convicted murderer entitled to for the newfound fame and attraction this documentary has generated to her advantage while unforgivingly resurfacing unwanted heartache for the victims’ families.  The girl is interviewed in prison with makeup on and a false and overly dramatic sense of “regret” and “grief.”  It’s no surprise that she is reportedly the “It Girl” in the prison where she is serving time.  With a societal zest for reality television and true life crime stories, even stemming back to the OJ Simpson bruhaha, so many people shamelessly carry the Suzanne Stone gene.

Other stories came to mind while watching To Die For, including the musical Chicago which follows a very similar trajectory – fame might be the one factor that could exonerate you for murder.  Heathers explored the need for popularity, attention, and public sympathy by only just attempting suicide. Faye Dunaway’s character in Network (still the best satire, in my opinion) pounces on a man’s mental ailment to generate viewership and ratings climbs for programming success.  Notoriety can be a terrible sin. Yet, notoriety offers a wealth of advantages.

To Die For is shocking, hilarious, and much more relatable than it ever was when released in 1995.  It’s a comedy of ridiculous truths that will leave you thinking. Wisely, Gus Van Sant runs the closing credits of the film over an ice-skating routine performed by Illeana Douglas which is likely one of the most inspiring closing scenes you could ever find in a movie.  As insightful as Joyce Maynard might have been with her published novel, there’s no way her final pages could equate to how karmic Van Sant and Henry opted close out their film. Larry’s sister, Janice finally gets her moment in the spotlight for all the world to see.

BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK (1955)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

DIRECTOR: John Sturges
CAST: Spencer Tracy, Robert Ryan, Anne Francis, Walter Brennan, Ernest Borgnine, Lee Marvin
MY RATING: 9/10
ROTTEN TOMATOMETER: 97% Fresh

PLOT: Shortly after the end of World War II, a one-armed stranger arrives in a tiny desert town whose residents, for no apparent reason, behave in a hostile way towards him.


A stranger arrives by train at a small desert town.  The conductor tells him it’s the first time the train has stopped there in four years.  The stranger carries a briefcase in his one good arm.  The residents are apprehensive about him, hostile towards him, and do everything short of pointing a gun at him to force him back wherever he came from.  Who is he?  Why is he here?  And why does everyone get nervous when he asks how to get to a place called Adobe Flat?

This sounds like the setup for one of Clint Eastwood’s “Man-with-No-Name” spaghetti westerns, and if those films weren’t at least subtly influenced by this one, I’d be extremely surprised.  John Sturges’ Bad Day at Black Rock is a mystery-thriller as lean and mean as you can possibly get.  With a running time of a scant eighty-one minutes, this is one of the best examples of a film that wastes no time on side-plots or unnecessary filler.  Get in, get out, nobody gets hurt.  Well…in this case, that’s not entirely true…

The story takes place in October, 1945.  Spencer Tracy plays John J. Macreedy, a military veteran – he lost the use of his left arm in Italy – even though he looks a bit old to have been a combat soldier.  But I’m willing to believe he was an officer of some kind.  The locals, including Reno Smith (Robert Ryan) and his heavies, Coley (Ernest Borgnine) and Hector (Lee Marvin), wheedle and needle him non-stop, trying to get a rise out of him.  At first, I wrote this off to the Hollywood convention of the backwater burg whose citizens simply don’t like strangers for no reason at all.  As the movie plays out, the reason for their behavior becomes clear…a depressingly relevant reason still today.

Because the movie is so short, and because the plot turns so decisively on the revelation of what Macreedy is doing in Black Rock, I can’t divulge any more plot details.  But I admire the movie’s methodology.  Enemies become allies, and vice versa.  Some of the dialogue is reminiscent of Mamet.  Some examples:

  • “I’m half-horse, half-alligator – you mess with me and I’ll kick a lung outta ya!”
  • “She must have strained every muscle in her head to get so stupid.”
  • “You’re not only wrong.  You’re wrong at the top of your voice.”

There’s a kind of poetry there that I usually only find in films-noir.  I don’t think Bad Day at Black Rock qualifies as noir, but I guess someone forgot to tell the screenwriter.  I have no problem with that.

I also admired the plot revelation concerning Macreedy’s business in Black Rock.  I’m no film historian, but I’m willing to bet there weren’t very many movies in the years immediately following World War II that dealt specifically with this issue.  The fact that this one was made by a top-tier director with such a powerhouse leading man surrounded by a talented ensemble, in CinemaScope…I’d love to do some more research to learn the general public’s reaction to the picture and its message.  I know it’s critically acclaimed now, but I just wonder…

Bad Day at Black Rock is best experienced in a vacuum.  If you’ve read this far, don’t read anything else about it before seeing it.  Let the story come to you organically with no pre-conceived notions.  This is a great film.

THE SECRET AGENT (PORTUGUESE, 2025)

By Marc S. Sanders

I’m not going to pretend I understand all of the dynamics of the Portuguese film The Secret Agent.  Most of the events occur in Brazil, dating back to 1977 – apparently a time of “mischief,” as the opening text describes.  Mischief is not the term I would use, but perhaps it is how a totalitarian regime dismisses their fearful and harsh dominance over its people.  Writer/director Kleber Mendonça Filho drives home the message that it is unwise to rebel against the government.  Still, it may be a necessary evil to welcome an independent future, unchained from a fascist government.

Celebrated Brazilian star and Oscar nominee Wagner Moura is Armando Alves.  The story begins as he pulls into a gas station only to see a corpse covered by cardboard lying a few yards away in the dirt.  Rabid dogs are wanting to sniff and feed off the remains.  Seeing a dead body may alarm any of one of us, but Armando seems personally concerned at that random sight.  Filho’s story will eventually make us understand why his protagonist returns to his hometown of Recife with an enormous amount of dread.

Elsewhere, back where he worked as a technology expert, there’s a gruesome and unforgettable discovery.  A severed human leg is wedged within the maw of a dead shark resting upon an operating table.  The local constable, Euclides (Robério Diógenes) and his sons have been summoned to investigate.  It’s gruesome but the Sheriff and his cohorts find amusement in this gore.

The Secret Agent is hardly anything of what its title implies, but it’s biting with suspense.  Kleber Mendonça Filho constructs scenes that honor American classics like Goodfellas, The Bourne Ultimatum, another actual film called Secret Agent, and especially The Godfather and Jaws.  The latter operating as a driving element that bonds Armando to his young son Fernando (Enzo Nunes).  The story operates like a chase film, though there’s not much running to be had.  It’s all about how this man can remain hidden with only his deceased wife’s parents knowing specifically why he’s in town.  

By the way, rhetorically speaking, why is his wife deceased?  

Armando is hiding along with others considered to be rebellious against the government.  Go against the doctrine and risk being apprehended or executed.  The best that this man can do is hide in plain sight as someone else under a different identity.  He’s now known as Marcelo.

As I noted earlier, I have no knowledge of Brazilian history.  So initially it was challenging to understand the circumstances of the time and setting.  Portraits of Brazil’s President are hung everywhere.  Kleber Mendonça Filho makes sure to get push in shots repeatedly of this imposing, uniformed figurehead.  So, wherever you go, you will be found.  It’s interesting to see the big bad of this piece limited to a photograph that repeatedly appears.  Otherwise, the antagonists consist of a pair of smart and ruthless father/son assassins, the wealthy industrialist with a personal vendetta who hires these men to hunt down Armando, and a local corrupt police captain, Euclides. 

The Secret Agent requires an aggressive exercise in reading the English subtitles of this fast-talking Portuguese film.  There are also moments that weigh down the pace of the film.  For example, when Armando arrives at his hideaway, the seventy-seven year old woman who keeps the domicile has to introduce the other refugees he will be living with, while walking us through the vast labyrinth of this apartment building.  It’s a drawn out scene that mostly feels pointless as many of these characters have no major significance to the story.  

Kleber Mendonça Filho’s technique often reminded me of Quentin Tarantino.  It’s clear he is a lover of movies by drawing inspiration from favorite sequences in other celebrated films.  There’s even an incredibly odd sort of nightmare involving a terrorizing—well…I’m not going to spoil that.  See for yourself what comes out of nowhere.  

Still, many scenes occur in the back room of a local cinema adjacent to the projection booth where Armando’s father-in-law works.  What’s playing? The Omen.  A resistance leader, named Elza (Maria Fernanda Cândido) archives recordings of Armando’s testimonies but admits she and her partner nearly shit themselves watching the horror piece.  Imagine the power of film.  Amid all of this real life, bloody turmoil, and still The Omen and Jaws can scare the living crap out of you.

The Secret Agent surprised me with its tension.  I believe I am typically challenged to connect with films and characters that speak a language that I’m unfamiliar with while occupying a locale I have little knowledge of.  It’s often frustrating.  Yet, I feel wiser for having watched Kleber Mendonça Filho’s film.  An interesting dimension presents itself midway through as suddenly we see laptops and cell phones enter the piece.  Like the film taught me, archived recordings of Armando and other refugees are played on cassette to lend a first person point of view to what was happening fifty years earlier.  The need to know more and uncover what ultimately happened to Armando is absorbed by a young student named Flavia (Laura Lufési) who is motivated to explore beyond the recordings and go out into the modern world of Recife.

This story recollects a frightening time in Brazil’s late twentieth century history with dangerous threats coming from all sides.  It’s fascinating to see this man, Armando, try to uphold a sense of normalcy for the sake of his young son.  From Fernando’s perspective, his father and grandparents try to shelter him from seeing the scary movie phenomenon, Jaws.  At his age, it’s better he only knows how terrifying Jaws is compared to what’s occurring on the streets of his hometown and within his country.  

The Secret Agent is an excellent film.  One of the best of 2025’s Oscar nominated pictures.

BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD

By Marc S. Sanders

When it comes to crime – New York crime – few directors come as close as Sidney Lumet to make an audience feel the authenticity of its trappings.  Maybe only Martin Scorsese can stand next to Lumet.  Either with crime on the streets (Dog Day Afternoon, Serpico) or within the courtrooms (Find Me Guilty, 12 Angry Men), or both (Night Falls On Manhattan), Sidney Lumet hones directly upon how the plans should operate and when everything should unfold or derail.  

With the last picture before his death, Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead zeroes in on crime within an educated Irish family nucleus.  Andrew (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) has it laid out perfectly for his younger brother Hank (Ethan Hawke) to commit the perfect robbery. No one will get hurt and the insurance company will cover any loss.  The approximate take is around six hundred thousand. These guys carry their own desperate reasons for even considering such an idea, but Andy knows nothing can go wrong.  Hank has some trepidation though, because the target is mom and dad’s jewelry store.

Kelly Masterson’s script shows how quickly everything comes undone with bloodshed and unaccounted for details that could lead straight back to the two brothers.  It’s all told through three different perspectives – Andy, Hank and their father Charles played by Albert Finney.  Often, Lumet will return to the very same scene you saw moments earlier to show two sides of a phone call or in what direction one character goes versus that of another following a particular action that has occurred.  The timeline even jumps back in time a few days to show the direct perspective of any of these three particular characters ahead of showpiece scene – the robbery. Charles was retaking his driver’s license test. Elsewhere, Hank was struggling to pay spousal and child support with an angry ex-wife (Amy Ryan). Andrew was scheming and committing other clandestine acts both at work and in his free time.

However, Masterson’s script weaves all of these side details into how much more complicated this botched robbery becomes in the aftermath. All of what they commit following the robbery compounds into potentially making it worse for everyone involved.

Some of the breadcrumbs don’t carry enough water at times though. You might have to tolerate the characters being more intuitive than they likely should be.  Andrew leaves a business card with a side character.  When the film circles back to this item, it seems a little too easy for someone else to get wise about what has transpired.  I just chose to go with it.

Marisa Tomei is also part of the cast, caught in a love triangle as Andy’s wife and Hank’s mistress.  Tomei is really good, lending some authenticity with unscrupulous nudity in scenes with both Hoffman and Hawke.  This storyline serves as character exposition and only briefly scrapes against the crime drama at play.  It could have been excised from the film, but because the dialogue and scenario is written and performed so well, it effectively held my attention.

Albert Finney is magnificent as the patriarch owner of the store.  Simply his devastated, echoey breathing and the way he fumbles to put his eyeglasses on to learn more about what has occurred is absolutely genuine.  A late middle-aged man discovering horrible truths.  Finney plays it beautifully.  That being said, I wish the film offered more backstory to his character.  There are few hints suggesting how he regarded Andy as the first born who needed be thrown to the wolves and learn to fend for himself.  Contrarily, Hank is the younger and more disappointing son.  Yet, the script is short on material that further explores the relationship between the father and his sons.  I felt the film demanded more because Charles is quite significant to the conclusion of the story, which carries an unexpectedly abrupt ending.  

The acting and assembly of time and perspective are so finely tuned by the whole cast under Lumet’s direction.  Still, Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead needed another twenty to thirty minutes of storytelling.  One character runs out of frame with an unfinished storyline.  Another, seems too hasty in making a final decision with an easy convenience.

Don’t get me wrong.  I strongly recommend this last effort from Sidney Lumet.  It’s a unique crime yarn with an especially conniving Phillip Seymour Hoffman doing some of his best work.  The set up had me riveted and I couldn’t wait to see how all these terrible scenarios were going to fix themselves or make things horribly worse.

A SIMPLE PLAN

By Marc S. Sanders

“Three can keep a secret if two are dead.”  – Benjamin Franklin, pictured on the one-hundred-dollar bill

A murder of crows is made especially prominent at the beginning of this dark, wintry fable from director Sam Raimi and writer Scott B Smith, based off of his novel, A Simple Plan.  

On the afternoon of New Year’s Eve Day, Hank, his brother Jacob and Leon get swerved off a slippery Minnesota road while riding in a beat-up pickup truck. They come upon a crashed airplane buried under a blanket of snow in the woods.  Besides the pecking crows feasting on the corpse of a dead pilot, they uncover a duffle bag with over four million dollars; tons of bales of strapped hundred-dollar bills.  What should they do? Report the discovery to the police or secretly keep it to divide among themselves?

Hank (Bill Paxton) is the educated sensible member of the trio.  Jacob (Billy Bob Thornton) is his dim-witted brother.  Leon (Brent Briscoe) is Jacob’s loudmouth drinking buddy.  After much debate, the men agree that Hank will hold on to the money until springtime.  By then, if no one is looking for the loot, then it surely can be shared among them.  

Easier said than done.

This is one of Bill Paxton’s best roles, not only because he’s a fine actor, but his character is constructed beautifully with one internal conflict after another.  He carries an appearance of a doting husband to his pregnant wife Sarah (Bridget Fonda, who I wish never retired from acting) and he’s well-liked by the folks of this town.  He’s also a protective brother to Jacob.   However, money changes people and hypocrisy and plotting turn this good man corrupt.

Billy Bob Thornton is brilliant in an Oscar nominated role. It’s not easy to portray the sweet dumb guy when your career has demonstrated how insightful you are as a winning screenwriter and actor (Sling Blade).  Jacob looks “lived in” within this sleepy town with a pair of broken eyeglasses, an old parka and boots.  He’s the troublemaker and the sheriff knows this schlub can’t take care of himself.  As Hank changes one way over the course of the film, Jacob literally transitions in a completely opposite direction of character.  Both approach their tests of ethics and morality differently, and it’s fair to say that a gift of simple logic and sensibility can be more of a curse rather than a blessing.

Bridget Fonda operates like a conniving Lady MacBeth as Hank’s wife Sarah.  She’s adorable and sweet as the happy couple await the delivery of their first child any day now.  What good fortune to come upon this money to help with living a lifetime of comfort and joy.  Sarah knows this is all going to work out, but what’s important is that Hank covers his tracks while also being especially cautious of Leon and Jacob’s reputation for carelessness.  Sarah has an answer for everything and a proactive approach to handle this surprise windfall.

Yet, the luck of one man is the demise of another, and another and maybe even another.  

A Simple Plan is anything but.  Too many people know what is discovered.  Even the inconvenience of snow-covered plains work against any kind of airtight solution.  Snow leaves tracks.  What if someone lets a simple, but curious, word slip?  What if someone wants his share sooner than agreed upon?  What if someone is in the wrong place at the wrong time? 

Scott B Smith changes the tune of his script over and over.  First, it questions the morality of man.  Later, it traverses into crime and cover up.  After that, A Simple Plan hinges upon survival while questioning a series of costs.

Because most of the characters in this small Minnesota town are blue collar and not formally educated, you might believe they lack the intuition to properly guard themselves or the ones they hold dear.  On the surface, this is a friendly community, and everyone bears a facade of innocence with Happy New Year greetings. Actually, desperation only enhances the thinking abilities of these people to do the most twisted of acts to protect what they consider their rightful, personal entitlement.  

Each act of extreme behavior seems justified in the eyes of Hank, Jacob, Sarah and Leon. I mean this is four million dollars we are talking about here.  Try to see it their way, and you’ll know what I mean.

WAKE UP DEAD MAN

By Marc S. Sanders

Benoit Blanc is back with a new mystery to solve in Wake Up Dead Man.  With three films, all directed by Rian Johnson (Knives Out, Glass Onion), Daniel Craig’s eccentric detective now belongs in the ranks of Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot.  He’s a pleasure to watch with a smirk on your face.  Ironically, he doesn’t make his entrance until at least a third of the picture is complete.

Josh O’Connor is Father Jud Duplenticy who first reveals a wide berth of exposition ahead of the murder mystery that awaits us.  He’s a catholic priest who works hard to contain his temper that might resort to raising his fists.  He’s been assigned as the assistant minister to a church in a small New England town where everyone knows one another, especially repulsive Monsignor Jefferson Wicks (Josh Brolin).

Whodunit mysteries should never be spoiled.  I certainly wouldn’t imply how this film wraps up.  I also do not want to reveal who the victim(s) is/are.  I urge you to see Wake Up The Dead Man because this puzzler of a story is as gleeful as the title itself.

Like the Agatha Christie film adaptations from the 1970s, Rian Johnson does his best to provide a lineup of suspects with celebrity familiarity including Brolin, O’Connor, Mila Kunis, Kerry Washington, Thomas Hayden Church, Cailee Spaeny, Jeremy Renner and a standout performance from Glenn Close who steals much of the film away from the rest of the cast.  After seven nominations spanning over forty years, give her the Oscar already.  She’s eerie and needling, spooky and fun.  As Detective Blanc continues his investigation, a character tells him this all seems like something straight out of Scooby Doo.  Glenn Close, donned in black with an elderly bleached facade certainly feels like she’d come in contact with the animated pup and those meddling kids.

Rian Johnson writes with that classic narrative that Agatha Christie or Arthur Conan Doyle adopted, only it’s modernized.  The director of The Last Jedi even throws in a Star Wars reference and the joke soars.  The writer/director crafted this script as an invitation for hair raising merriment with his design.  If you can’t be a part of a mystery dinner theater party, he ensures that you can participate in this one.

An old church, priests who curse, habitually pleasure themselves and confess to an abundance of sins, a gothic tomb, a dark basement with a repulsive bathtub, a bar with a photograph of clues, startling entrances, unconventional dialogue and a quizzical murder weapon function like page turning literature.  Even better is to understand how impossible the first murder can be under the limitations of a locked door mystery.  How can someone be killed right in front of our eyes when no one else is in room?  The answers await and thankfully the revelations are not far-fetched.

Wake Up Dead Man is a fun time at the movies.  It’s coming to Netflix on December 12, 2025.  Nevertheless, I encourage you to go your local cinema.  The crowd we saw it with was responding consistently with us, and that only enhances the experience.

GONE BABY GONE

By Marc S. Sanders

Ben Affleck’s directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone, is crime drama mystery thriller that never offers easy answers and concludes with great debate.  You’ll ask yourself if right decisions were made.  You will argue with your best friend or significant other about the endings.  What’s undeniable though is that the film, adapted from Dennis Lehane’s novel, is full of an array of characters, most operating with the best of intentions, and yet they wind up doing everything wrong or against their sworn principles.  In order to work the problem, these people will have to betray themselves. 

One of Affleck’s many best decisions was casting his brother Casey Affleck in the lead role of private detective Patrick Kenzie.  With his girlfriend, Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan), they specialize in tracking down missing persons in and around the Southeastern Boston area.  The brothers’ pairing is especially effective as Boston, Massachusetts is where they were born and raised.  They know this setting intimately. Unpolished multi-floored tenement neighborhoods near seedy watering holes are where the crimes of Gone Baby Gone occur.  Casey can ensure that his character, Patrick, can speak the slang, use the thick dialect, and feel comfortable amid a crowded and overpopulated area. As director, Ben ensures the setting is captured in great detail from Red Sox caps to beat up cars and dirty unkept apartments and secret hang outs.

In the middle of the night a little girl has gone missing and her deadbeat, drug addicted, careless mother Helene (Amy Ryan) is unmotivated to offer the police much to go on. Helene’s brother and sister-in-law (Titus Weliver, Amy Madigan) take it upon themselves to hire Patrick and Angie to find their niece.  The only leads that Patrick, Angie and the police (Ed Harris, John Ashton and occasionally Morgan Freeman) have to go on are Helene’s contacts within the drug peddling underground.  Someone within that community might have taken the girl or know someone who did.

Gone Baby Gone may feel like a Law & Order episode where red herrings are offered early and then dismissed for the actual truth.  However, Lehane’s story twists much deeper beneath the surface.  Not one character is wasted in this film.  Each serves a purpose to how and why this crime ever occurred.  Mysteries get resolved but the answers are not simple because they are multi-layered with many different people spinning twice as many plates.

Ben Affleck seems nothing like an amateur director here.  He does not always rely on dialogue to describe a scenario because he films quite a bit of a disheveled room or kitchen, or an outdoor area.  A daylight scene will take place in a darkly lit bar where only people need to hide from their troubles on an ordinary workday, or maybe they are in there to suppress something uglier.

The cast is outstanding.  While the characters belonging to Freeman, Harris and Ashton seem familiar from much of their other career films, they look like they lived within this environment of three-story houses bordering the harbor, across town from Fenway.  You believe these guys know every alleyway, street corner or contact among the city’s small-time deadbeats. 

Amy Ryan was nominated, and perhaps should have won, for her trashy Bostonian performance as Helene, the missing girl’s mother.  This actress is buried so deep in this role, from her worn out facial features to her New England dialect that blends so well.  She is completely believable, which is why you would not be able to stand sharing the same space with her.

Titus Welliver dons a thick, wide Irish mustache.  I read he had to keep it because he was shooting his HBO series, Deadwood, at the same time.  Nonetheless, it builds his character into the blue-collar working man whose greatest achievement is getting out of the life of small-time crime in order to put food on the table, while his sister could not.  His wife played by the great Amy Madigan, an actress that does not get enough coverage, is perfect.  Just her facial expressions with a pale, freckled complexion, tight chin and pinched lips show her biting her tongue while in the same room as her loser sister-in-law.  It sickens her that a sweet little girl like her niece is missing.  Everything is read on her face.  I know Madigan best as Kevin Costner’s midwestern cheerful wife in Field Of Dreams.  She played this role almost two decades later and she absolutely hides herself.  You forget you are watching her.  An outstanding character actress.  (I’m glad she’s getting new recognition with 2025’s hit horror movie Weapons.)

Michelle Monaghan as the girlfriend Angie is the sidekick to Casey Affleck’s Patrick.  Yet, she makes the horror of this movie convincingly real.  Early on, Angie is reluctant to accept the case because she doesn’t “want to find a kid in a dumpster.”  Now this isn’t some Dirty Harry or Lethal Weapon cop showcase.  It’s not glamourized with Hannibal Lecter glee.  This has not become much further materialized.  I don’t want to see a horrifying outcome for a child either, but Ben Affleck’s direction does not make any promises.  There are some repulsive, scary people in this world, right outside the front doors where people listen to the game on the radio and kids play stickball in the street.  Monaghan seems like that young woman who came from another place in the country with a fine upbringing and fell in love with Affleck’s character. With her brains, instincts and empathy, Angie took up the cause as a fellow crusader.  None of this is spelled out in the film and I have not read Lehane’s books, but I can see it in Michelle Monaghan’s performance.

Casey Affleck is a perfect surprise.  He dons the appearance of a thin, shrimpy kind of kid (supposedly age 31), and yet no matter who he is coming face to face with he never shows any sort of apprehension.  I truly believe that Patrick is not afraid of his work or the people he has to confront while trying to solve his various mysteries.  If a large gun is introduced into a scene, Patrick’s reaction is an act of “whoa, what’s this?”  Another character in another film would tighten up and hold their breath, or they would knock the weapon out of the way for an action scene.  Patrick has put this kind of act on before to outlast a situation.  Angie has definitely seen it before. 

Casey Affleck is great at just listening.  Shortly after he accepts the case, Patrick and Angie are in one of these darkened bars trying to collect information.  Ben Affleck shoots his camera above Casey sitting in a booth with a beer.  The actor keeps his head tilted as if he is listening to nothing spewing from a possible lead sitting across the table.  When a gun is pulled though, Casey stands three feet taller than his posture implies and controls the scene.  That is Dennis Lehane’s character Patrick Kensie completely defined because Casey Affleck has a full understanding of this guy.  Someone like Patrick knew that if he was going to take this kind occupation on full time, he had better be aware he would not survive on brawn that he cannot show.  It’s a confidence that has to come through. 

Gone Baby Gone is a gripping and engaging thriller shown with varying degrees of light and perfect cinematography to offer genuine on-site locations of Boston and the surrounding areas.  Ben Affleck chose not to compromise any of his set pieces.  With handheld cameras, when a missing person’s search is happening, it feels like a documentary of procedure is being shown. 

The various directions and endings are entirely unexpected and yet very, very plausible.  This is a smart, sensational crime drama that deserves a resurgence of attention nearly twenty years after its release.

A CLOCKWORK ORANGE

By Marc S. Sanders

What is Stanley Kubrick attempting to demonstrate with A Clockwork Orange, arguably the most controversial and shocking film of his career?  The film is considered an almost precise adaptation of Anthony Burgess’ novel.  I never read the book, but the sources I found on Wikipedia and IMDb are consistent with their claims.  Kubick’s vision is never not odd or strange.  It’s almost always repulsive and I have to believe the director is proud of the finished accomplishments left in every caption and scene.  Yet even Kubrick was disgusted by some copycat attempts that spawned from what the story’s protagonist troublemaker executes within this context.  Regrettably, in 2025, it would be easier to ask what did you expect Mr. Kubrick?

In a dystopian future of England, young Alex (age 17, but 15 in the book) relishes on walking the streets each night, accompanied by his three droog companions, committing the worst atrocities imaginable.  They beat up a homeless beggar, engage in gang brawling, and brutalize and rape a wealthy couple in their own home to the celebrated tune of Singin’ In The Rain.  I’m curious how reminiscent A Clockwork Orange is to people who only wish to watch the cheerful and innocent fare of Gene Kelley.  Is their subconscious intruded by Malcolm McDowell as naughty boy Alex with the one eyelash, bowler hat, protective jock strap and erection mask?

Mayhem is the specialty of Alex and his degenerate friends.  However, Alex who is the leader of the pack is challenged to uphold his command on the gang of four, and once the others betray him, the poor boy is sentenced to a militaristic, concentrated prison where he must don an academy uniform while studying the gospel of the Bible.  

What happens though if the student sees himself more as the Roman with the harsh whip, and less as the savior willing to die for our sins?  Are people like Alex only inherently wicked, vile, and perverted?  Can nothing change their insatiable appetites for harm and evil doing?

I thought about One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest while watching A Clockwork Orange.  McMurphy fakes an impression of insanity to be institutionalized. He operates under the presumption the circumstances will be more accommodating than a jail cell.  Alex campaigns to be a guinea pig for a new kind of therapy believed to eliminate all temptations of violence and cruel sexual escapades. This could be a means to free him from a forty-year prison sentence. I never believed he wanted to be liberated from his appetite of rape, torture and murder, though.

Following an abundance of sickening, visual exposition, Stanley Kubrick is ready to test some possible outcomes by forcefully prying open the subject’s eyes to witness footage of violence, extreme rape, harsh pornography, and Nazi propaganda.  Will this overexposure repulse Alex away from being the monster he used to be?

I’m not sure A Clockwork Orange provides any definitive answers but the weirdness of this off scale and ugly England is nothing but apparent.  Nothing is normal looking or relatable in this film.  Everything from the colors to the costume wear to the slang verbiage of the dialogue and even the furniture is completely twisted.  Kubrick would offer a similar approach in The Shining. No director is louder and more offensive with colors in a film. A green bedroom ceiling or a blue typewriter or even a glass of milk and stark white sexually posed mannequins used as furniture pieces in a hangout joint are so much more than discomforting.

Even the infamous rape scene is uncharacteristically done.  The Droogs happily sing while brutalizing this couple.  Before Alex commits his “push in, push out” he scissors the woman’s red jumpsuit around her individual breasts before cutting her out of the fabric to be entirely nude.  I’ve seen plenty of staged rape scenes but then there is what Kubrick envisions. Not to mention, how notoriously redundant he is with repetitively shooting his scenes over and over again. Kubrick is an auteur filmmaker but his desire for perfection in his shots are as twisted as many of his films.

A woman is brutally killed by being pummeled with a sculpture of a penis/taint/anus piece. (I don’t know what else you call this!) A typical baseball bat, stick or hammer is not the bludgeoning weapon of choice. Stanley Kubrick wants to ensure this perverted item of art owned by a wealthy woman is used to commit the crime. A mix of sinful natures ranging from sexual to violent.

Why go to all of these lengths to be so unusual?

A Clockwork Orange is deliberately shocking and thus everything on display is disorienting.  With all the movies and TV shows I’ve watched, on top of some of the most unusual fetishistic material I’ve witnessed, I imagine I’m like most viewers where I’ve grown accustomed to the violent and sexual debauchery on display.  I’ve seen so much I am practically desensitized to it all.  When I read about another school shooting in the news, regrettably and with sick sarcasm, I’ll think to myself, “Huh!  Must be a Tuesday.”  It feels so wrong but there is truth in this ongoing epidemic. Stanley Kubrick, back in the early 1970s, had to work that much harder to grab the attention of the viewer.  Nothing can prepare you for an initial viewing of A Clockwork Orange. Back in 1971, I’d argue no one was prepared for this film’s content. It’s a pioneering document of extreme violence and sexual perversion. Filmmakers, like Martin Scorsese, David Lynch, and Brian DePalma hereafter would push their own limits while bridging these activities with the natures of their challenged characters.

Is there a confidence to seeing if a heathen like Alex can be cured of his original nature? Can he be returned to a society where his once menacing threat is nonexistent?  Plus, can Alex live a peaceful and nurturing life?

Alex is not the only villain to this piece.  While we do not get to know his parents well enough, how sadistic are the individuals behind his therapy process? Alex’ “recovery” becomes politicized and treated like scientific doctrine at the expense of his own humiliation. He is used to prove a point by beating him up publicly and forcing him to lick the bottom of a man’s shoe and exposing him to a naked woman, as well. Those that he encounters again, like former victims and fellow Droogs, following his therapy are not perfectly complimented to this new Alex. Scenarios that re-introduce him to society imply that Alex’ conditioning process might have overlooked what was to come following his release. Were they truly “healing” their patient?

A Clockwork Orange is never a refreshing film.  It’s always alarming right down to its final frame.  The picture certainly does not endorse the merits of psychotherapy or psychological reform.  Maybe, that’s why I believe that anyone specializing in the field of mental health should watch the picture. See what works and what doesn’t. Kubrick is uncompromising with getting his cast to do what he wants, no matter how off putting the material is. If anything, I wonder if this movie is more relevant today. Can anyone who traps themselves in an impersonal and isolated environment of social media influence attain the capability to shed their destructive proclivities for a natural desire to live, care and cherish fellow human beings?

Like most of Kubrick’s films, A Clockwork Orange is not an easy watch.  I know a friend who describes the movie as a comedy.  I know what she’s talking about and why. Still, how can anyone allow themselves to guffaw at someone who is an agent of death, torture, destruction and chaos? 

I don’t know what else I can say about A Clockwork Orange.  I do not recall asking so many questions in one review as I demonstrate here. Watch the film on mute or with Alex’ voiceover against an assortment of classical music as Kubrick intends simply because Alex’ only friend, only ally, is “Ludwig.”  No matter how you observe the piece, it is likely your jaw will drop, and your eyes will wince.  You will cringe and you will unquestionably test your tolerance.  You may just turn the movie off.

Regardless of how you respond to the picture, be assured that Stanley Kubrick successfully completed what he set out to do.

BLOW OUT

By Marc S. Sanders

Brian DePalma’s Blow Out is an inventive approach to the political conspiracy thriller.  In 1981, following a mask of innocence the United States lost with the assassination of President Kennedy, later his brother Bobby, plus the drunken, liable carelessness of their brother Ted, and then finally the Watergate scandal, DePalma capitalized on newsworthy incidents to make a paranoid thriller of present day while incorporating what he likely knows much about which is sound effects editing.  Despite the cheesy music soundtrack that is highly intrusive and poorly composed, Blow Out is a good blend of hysteria and suspense.

John Travolta plays Jack Terry, a Philadelphia sound effects recording artist for b-grade schlock horror movies.  One night, while out in a park trying to pick up sounds of outdoor nature, he witnesses a car suffer a blown-out tire and crash into a nearby river.  Jack is able to rescue a woman named Sally (Nancy Allen) but cannot save the Pennsylvania governor who was driving the car.

As he is about to leave the hospital, he is specifically instructed to never speak to Sally nor acknowledge to anyone about any of his own involvement in this incident.  However, Jack cannot help but recount the sequence of events in his head and as new details come to light, he knows that there is a cover up at play.

Blow Up operates like a how-to kind of picture.  The expertise of a sound effects recording artist is demonstrated as Jack replays every sound that his equipment picked up. Later he’s able to manufacture his own film by assembling a series of published photographs that also captured the crash.  Sync up the sounds with the sights and a new theory surfaces.  Other mysteries change the course of the riddle through dialogue.  This character has to work by himself using the skills he’s acquired to learn the truth.  He hardly has anyone to commiserate with.

John Travolta is convincing within this occupation that’s not as common as a cop or a private eye.  I like how I can pick up how he uses his recording equipment and even the minute details like labeling what he has preserved within his inventory.

It took a little bit of patience to get used to Nancy Allen’s damsel in distress who plays it up like Judy Holliday or Jean Hagen with the squeaky, dingbat voice.  When we first meet her, she is in an intoxicated stupor that goes on a little too long. Nevertheless, I came around because the tension of the film builds quite well.

John Lithgow is the sadistic adversary – a serial killer and assassin rolled into one.  He’s got the weird, unwelcome appearance like any bad guy in a Hitchcock film.

DePalma is known for his split screen cuts that he offered in Carrie and later in Mission: Impossible.  More well known is his reliance on bringing a character in zoom close up, while in the same frame, another object will be zoomed out at a distance.   During an outdoor evening in the park, an owl hoots and stares us down while John Travolta is far in the background standing on a bridge. Within this same moment, DePalma does it again with a toad ribbiting up close with the actor again positioned out. It’s a disorienting approach that works well at maintaining the perplexity of his story.

I think the final act of Blow Out falls apart a bit.  Travolta is on the heels of rescuing Sally by rampaging his jeep through a crowded parade.  The scene is shot so aggressively that it was hard for me to believe he would survive much less not run down a cop, spectator, or the entire marching band.  DePalma could have tightened this up a bit.

Blow Out ends on a bleak irony that’s quite surprising and definitely against formula.  There’s a running gag for Jack and a film director as they edit a silly problematic issue for a new slasher flick.  I guessed early on how this was going to resolve itself.  Though I was right, I didn’t expect how the conclusion arrived at my predication.  

As well, there are some notable questions left unanswered.  I had to roll back and see if I missed something.  I didn’t.  DePalma’s script neglects some key points with unfinished resolutions. So, I was not entirely satisfied. Still, the how-to procedures along with the pursuit of the truth, while also evading demise, are very engaging.

When I conduct workshops on playwriting, I always recommend keeping up with the news.  An unending wealth of ideas are there to be discovered.  As a sincere compliment to Brian DePalma, it could not be more apparent where his creativity took off with this film.  As a skilled and educated filmmaker, he also writes what he knows.  

Blow Out is very close to being a smart nail biter that echoes the sad truths of political rule breaking by means of savage crime. I wish modern films would be as risky today.  There are so few of these kinds of thrillers being made anymore.