carassured

A very well made, well put together movie. It was beautifully filmed and competently acted. The character development was a little light, but no more so than in most ninety-odd-minute offerings. The plot itself was an interesting take on the time loop, Groundhog Day story.

The film progressed nicely, although it was extremely light on action, with only one short scene. There were some gaps, rather than plot holes, in the story, but nothing noteworthy. It was a slick-looking, stylish movie. So, why only four stars? Well, something was missing. I do not know what it was, but it was absent. A full thirty minutes passed before anything really happened, and then the conclusion became obvious at about the seventy-minute mark.

I am genuinely baffled as to why I found it so incredibly boring.

A little formulaic - there are certainly no surprises - and it's clearly not had the benefit of a big budget, but it's a watchable film.

The clichés start rolling in right at the beginning. Gretchen Blair (Denise Richards) is an FBI agent who doesn't play by the rules. During a hostage situation, where a perpetrator has gone berserk at the IRS offices because he hasn't received his tax rebate/refund cheque she handles things her own way, and although there is a positive outcome, this leads to her immediately being assigned a desk job and having her security clearance downgraded.

She leaves the scene and boards an aeroplane. After a disagreement in economy class, where her seat has been taken by someone else, she gets upgraded to business class. She is seated next to a passenger, Rick (Jonathan Lipnicki), and they make an attempt at small talk. Rick learns that Blair has trained with the FBI on terrorist and hijacking related rescue operations on this particular type of aircraft. Rick then discloses that the aeroplane is going to be hijacked and offers Blair $50m if she can get him safely off the plane.

What follows is a reasonably good hijacking movie. One of the hijackers, Matthew Sharpe (Dolph Lundgren), is played in the style of Dolph Lundgren, by Dolph Lundgren. But joking aside, it has a capable cast who do a good job. Another of the hijackers, Sadie (Greer Grammar), is marvellously psychopathic and is perhaps the character with the most depth in this movie, in which most of the characters are pretty shallow. I think it would have benefited greatly from building up the backstory of some of the characters, especially Rick.

The film is a little clumsy in places. No ground-breaking effects are used but the film does have its own feel and it reminds me at times of a James Bond film. In fairness though, a Bond movie from the eighties.

In summary, it's a B movie and it's alright.

The vigilante theme has been bread-and-butter to Hollywood for decades.

This movie does it a little differently. It concerns itself more with the psychological impact on the victim, in this case, a victim of rape. It also shows how this affects a whole family and exposes how crimes of this kind can also affect the family of the perpetrators.

The acting is superb. Obviously, with Nicholas Cage, no further expansion is needed. Talitha Bateman, the young girl who plays the daughter of the rape victim is exceptional. It does suffer from being a little clichéd in places and some of the characters could benefit from a little more depth, but it is worth watching, especially for its different perspective on the vigilante theme.

Teena, an attractive single mother (Anna Hutchinson) by chance meets John, an off-duty police officer (Nicolas Cage), in a bar. They strike up a friendly conversation and have a drink together. There is a little low-level flirting going on between them.

Teena is then seen at an Independence Day barbecue with her daughter, Bethie (Talitha Bateman). It is getting late; it is dark. She leaves with her daughter to head home. The pair take a shortcut through a lakeside wooded area. They run into a group of men who grab them both and force them into a disused boathouse. Bethie manages to break free and, because of her small size, wriggles into a storage area inside the boathouse. From there, she witnesses the brutal gang rape of her mother.

The men leave and Teena is left unmoving and bloodied on the floor of the boathouse. Bethie tries unsuccessfully to rouse her and leaves the boathouse to summon help. On the road she flags down a car, which turns out to be driven by John and his partner. They attend the scene of the crime. An ambulance is called and Teena is taken to hospital, where she regains consciousness. After a short convalescence, Bethie and Teena then move in with Teena's mum, Agnes (Deborah Kara Unger).

The men are identified by Bethie at an identification parade and a prosecution ensues. The accused men are represented by hot-shot lawyer, Jay Kirkpatrick (Don Johnson); the victim is represented by Dixon (Kara Flowers).

What follows is part courtroom drama, part psychological drama and part vigilante movie, highlighting the way courts have to balance the rights of the victim with those of the accused.