Living in Peril

It has Rob Lowe, which is good, but unfortunately the movie was just bad. There was a lot of random yelling, the acting was somewhat wooden in places and way to campy in others, and while you were apparently supposed to care about the peril Rob was in, you just didn't. As Rob so eloquently yelled somewhere in one of his paranoid tirades, 'Rat p*ss'. Yeah, that about sums it up.

I thought it was a very thrilling movie. The most people that don't enjoy those kind of movies are semi-blind and used to see only those 8.0+ mainstream movies. This isn't like that. This actually has a different vibe to it. If you truly are a thriller fan you will love it.

Architect Rob Lowe is Living in Peril when he travels to Los Angeles to present his drawings to wealthy builder James Belushi. And after he rents a flat in grumpy Dean Stockwell's apartment building, he has to deal with these two eccentric gentlemen as well as a sexually aggressive neighbour, a happy-go-lucky German, and an angry truck driver who was recently fired by his employer after Lowe complained about his driving.

This obscure film by the Swedish Ersgård brothers is worth a look, if not because of the story in itself, then because of the film's eccentric, evocative tone. An important factor in this is the nostalgic musical score and set direction, which together create an almost Hitchcockesque mood. The Ersgård brothers obviously knew what they wanted, and the film is also suspenseful on its own quirky level. There are lots of characters, entanglements and situations, and although our protagonist's choices sometimes seem more driven by the plot than by common sense, the film's stylized nature allows it to get away with that. The Ersgård brothers made a few more movies in the years following this, before disappearing from the scene.

This film was recently shown on Cable and the opening 5 minutes is terrific....the music is compelling...setting the scene for a person about to be trapped in a series of perilous incidents...... (anyone who has had one of those days when everything goes wrong can identity with this film!!!) I found at times there were elements of Hitchcock-like suspense with an excellent performance by the lead actor. There are superb performances by the actors playing the apartment manager, the wife, the prostitute and the performance by the german neighbour is compellingly good. I was absorbed by the whole movie with its first rate direction and script. It is a black comedy....comedy drama...and the only dissappointment is the actor playing the part of Harrison...who seems half-hearted throughout.......deduct 2 marks for that but its still an 8 out of 10. rbrb.

Even though LIVING IN PERIL has got a remarkable **swedish** feeling over it it S*U*C*K*S BIG TIME!

It has got simularities to just-as-awful CHILDREN OF THE DAMNED like so many other movies throughout Hollywood's history.

1. Laughable horrors. Nobody ever thought that white headed children was frightening, nor rats.

2. Stupid script, aka IDIOT-POLICE and A SILLY BAD-GUY.

and the classic one

3. ACTORS THAT ARE FUN TO WATCH JUST BECAUSE IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO TAKE THEM SERIOUS!!!! Just take Rob Lowe and James Belushi! And I thought the mix with Christopher Reeve, Mark Hamill, and Kirstey Alley was fun!

Otherwise we have great actors like Dean Stockwell and Earl Boen getting awfully thrown away.

Allow be to bring out a 3/10