larabeeslady

What's so incredibly bad about this movie is that it isn't even good enough to look like a fresh-out-film-school project, with those clumsy attempts to be arty and make up for that final C minus. The editing is choppy and the story makes no sense. (It's clear the filmmaker just wanted to make a statement, and sadly, there's no enough substance in that statement to fill 105 minutes.) The acting - oh, who am I kidding, there's no acting going on, just line recitation. All the characters talk exactly the same, and worse, all have the same bad dialog of that immature, bitter guy in his early 30s whose friends have all moved on while he wonders why he's the one who's still single. In fact, the characters are SO unlikeable, so shallow, so crude, so sex-obsessed, so mean-spirited, and so stupid, including the detectives, that you're forced to root for the killer just to get it over with. And that's the moment when you KNOW you've wasted minutes of your life you'll never get back.

An actor's first film is usually something one can afford to miss - it's often that first job where the lack of film experience by everyone involved is truly on display, and this film is no exception.

But worse than that, even by 1982 standards this is so bad, it's hysterically funny. Filmed entirely in the Chicago area on an obviously small budget, most of the acting by the entire cast is stiff, wooden, and cartoonish - a cross between a high school play and bad community theater. Noise from nearby traffic often drowns out the dialog, and the dialog is truly bad, very declarative in a way that comes off as forced and expedient rather than natural and organic. Scenes are contrived and choppy, and even though the characters go through a span of years, neither the children nor the adults age at all.

I do believe it's possible to make a Christian film that's palatable to a large, secular audience, but too often the creators of such films are so focused on 'The Message' or in this case, their own autobiographical ties to the project that good film production values are tossed aside. (I'm sure it's no coincidence that the main character has the same name as the producer/director/editor - and cast member.)

Luckily, Michael Madsen was much more interesting - and believable - to watch in his subsequent films. Careers like his are certainly not built on films like this one.

It's minute after ponderous minute, stretching into hours, followed by perhaps 3 to 5 minutes of true creepiness near the very end. And I do mean creepy. But that's a long wait for the few minutes you get out of it. Lots of plot holes you can fly a Boeing through, lots of things set up and then never resolved or even slightly explained, heavy on unexplained symbolism...The list goes on and on. In the end, I was bored and confused, and one creepy scene just isn't enough to justify the string of clichés and 'atmosphere' you have to sit through. I'm glad I rented it because I'd have been highly annoyed to have shelled out the full price of a theater ticket for this.