I'm a sucker for espionage movies filmed on location in Europe, so I was positively inclined toward this film, which I had never heard of before it cropped up on cable this week. I'm not sure how I missed it back in 1985, because I'm a Hackman fan and usually like movies of this type.
This is an OK film, but not a great one. The locations are superb, and there are enough car chases to keep guys like me happy. The basic idea of the film (family of man with secret past must pay for his actions) is all right, too, but it plays out in a rather clunky way. (The story, by the way, was written by Leonard Stern, the executive producer of the GET SMART TV show, and the co-inventor of "Mad Libs".)
Hackman is the best part of the picture. Josef Sommer is also good, but is basically playing the same role he played in WITNESS (also in 1985). He could phone in a part like this. What drags this movie down is the thoroughly annoying Matt Dillon subplot. I'm not sure if it's just Dillon the actor that bothers me, or his character. The screenwriters try to turn this film into a family drama, where the father is reconciled to his son while they search for the kidnapped mother. But the son is SO stupid and annoying, that if I were Gene Hackman, I'd let the KGB put Dillon in a cement overcoat and toss him in the Baltic. IMHO, this would have been a better film with Hackman searching by himself (along with his former lover, perhaps, who is a more interesting character than Dillon).
The closing climactic scene drags on WAY too long. The tension is gone long before it's over, and the fade-out shot of the cuddly family is trite. (If you think about it, they're still in a LOT of trouble at that point, probably more than an hour before!) A much better film with a similar plot (and good locations) is the Harrison Ford vehicle FRANTIC. For spy fans, TARGET is worth watching once, but won't bear repeating.
