Past Tense

OK, so you have to think as you watch - and after - but this film is a gem - and it hangs together even though it seems at times to be an incarnation of Twin Peaks - and THAT is NOT a bad thing! (There's even a Twin Peaks cast member aboard!) This is an excellent Psycho-Drama that will keep most theorizing right up to, through and past the end. Intelligent Film Noir, superbly cast and scripted - for those who like their Films Dark.

Here's a modern-day film noir in which you're never sure what's real and what isn't real. There is a possibility you may get tired of guessing and give up on this film 3/4ths of the way through, as I almost did but it worth finishing. It also was better the second time around

The problem is just too many flashbacks. If some of those scenes were not replayed so often, or a few of the many twists eliminated, it would have been a super movie. It still was fascinating in parts. It grabs you, and you can't stop watching to see what the real story is. Along the way, is a bunch of nice colors and some nice film noir-type in the beginning and then during the ending credits.

Former cop Gene Ralston (Scott Glenn) is haunted by confusion and is writing a hard-boiled crime novel about his new sexy neighbor (Lara Flynn Boyle). He has a sexual fling with her and a woman turns up dead there. More confusion arises. He fears evidence is piling up against him as his partner Larry Talbert (Anthony LaPaglia) investigates. Suddenly, there is a different woman living in that house and the murder never happened.

This starts as a neo-noir. It pushes very hard but that's acceptable. The problem starts with the confusing bits and pieces. It's intriguing when it first begins but soon it becomes tiresome. With all the jumbled pieces, the progression feels rather random. The pieces are all there. The fit is up in the air. At least, it's trying to do something.

'Past Tense' is the type of flick you start watching and the story grips you with it's mystery elements. Then the longer it goes the more it loses you and starts to feel tired. A good cast, a nice moment or two prolong the inevitable, but the last third takes a walk off the map. This was a tv movie of the week unbeknownst to me at the time.

Gene Ralston (Scott Glenn) a police detective & part time writer has a tryst with his new next-door neighbor Tory (Lara Flynn Boyle). When he discovers her murdered, Gene's partner Larry (Anthony LaPaglia) heads up the investigation and warns him off because he was involved with the victim. Yet he can't help but investigate anyhow. When he goes to discuss inconsistencies with Larry the next day, he doesn't know what he's talking about. A different person has lived in that house for a long time and it's like the woman never existed.

Splice in Gene's repeating dreams or nightmares, a psychiatrist and further down the rabbit hole we go. 'Past Tense' never slips into awful, but the big reveal isn't terribly satisfying. Glenn and LaPaglia are solid which isn't a shock. Boyle pulls off her role effectively. Sheree J. Wilson (Walker Texas Ranger) plays Larry's wife who tries to seduce Gene and gets topless. Wasn't expecting that. An okay one time watch.

Not a confusing film, but an intriguing one. Viewers learn more and more, and in the end everything is wrapped up and nothing is left without explanation.

Early on it calls to mind The Lady Vanishes (1937)...but it is different than that. Later on it calls to mind, to some degree, Jacob's Ladder (1990), but it is not that film either. There are aspects that almost seem surreal, until we gradually learn what is going on - there is a definite resolution; this is not like the stereotype of a David Lynch film.

A good suspense film that deals with memory and identity and their unravelling as a mystery.

Lara Flynn Boyle is especially attractive here: softer and not as extremely, frighteningly thin as she has been recently.