Sombras del pasado

I picked this movie up on vhs for 10 cents at the local goodwill. I wasn't expecting too much, but I knew Rutger Hauer was in it, and his movies are usually pretty good. I didn't expect for him to be playing a man so vulnerable though, he wasn't his usual tough and villainous character. What I also didn't expect was how well Natasha Richardson played her part, which was the trusting yet also vulnerable social worker Laura Matthews, tasked with finding a job for the parolled Ben Jordan (Hauer) Laura has suspicions of Jordan's guilt or innocence in the crime of killing his wife 15 years earlier, and she investigates, against her client's wishes. The movie moves along quite well and you're wondering whether he was guilty or not, and is Laura getting too close to him, endangering her own life and those around her.

Loved Rutger, liked the movie, and Quentin Tarantino wrote the script!

This turned out to be more of a women's romance-soap-suspense film than what I hoped it was....simply a tense thriller. Yes, the final 20 minutes were suspenseful but much of the previous 75 bordered on being just plain tedious.

Ruter Hauer was a little too subdued, not playing his normal intense character. Natasha Richardson sports somewhat of a dumb look most of the time and her character was very unappealing.

The story is so-so. It's not as bad as I'm making out, but it sure isn't anything I'd watch again, and the back of the VHS describing this movie was misleading.

Whilst this film is not going to re-invent the Suspense/Thriller genre it views as one that could have been an A movie with a little more money and a bit of promotion. Certainly not with a change of cast. The twists, the developing romantic theme, all make this worth your viewing time. Rutger Hauer has his own unique brand of acting and Natasha Richardson can not only act but is rather cute.

If Quentin Tarantino really wrote this movie, this is easily his worst cinematic endeavor.

Clearly, this story was written by frustrated men-children who don't have a clue how women's minds work. Somehow, a social worker falls in love with a hobo-looking older ex-con who not only acts like he's special needs, but also threatens her from day 1. What a Don Juan.

Hauer's character is the least likeable protagonist since WW2 movies about Hitler. Whether he killed his wife or not, he's a menacing jerk who stalks his social worker.

On top of that, the movie is poorly edited. Scenes jump around without warning, leaving the viewer to figure out how she's in her living room one minute and then waking up somewhere else entirely.

She never calls the cops when she should and by the end I was really hoping she'd get stabbed to death. Alas, we get a bizarre ending where the killer vomits a whole different movie on top of our damsel, which, frankly, might have made a much better movie than Past Midnight.

Get out of the house right meow! Oink oink.