MURDER AT 1600
1/2
WenQing
Directed by : Dwight Little
Written by : Wayne Beach and the late David Hodgin
Main Cast : Wesley Snipes (Harlan Regis), Diane Lane (Nina Chance), Alan Alda (Alvin Jordan), Daniel Benzali (Nick Spikings), Dennis Miller (Detective Stengel)
Produced by : Warner Bros.
Length : 100 minutes approx
Rating : ** 1/2
Theatres : Shaw Theatres
Official Web Site: Murder at 1600.Somehow, MURDER AT 1600 can't decide what it wants to be and really goes half-baked into all its forays. We don't have enough characterisation, and we don't have a good plot.
Here's how it happens : We have Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes), a homicide detective with a touch of cynicism. I imagine the cynicism is supposed to spring from being jaded with the troubles of Washington's crime rate. But then we have seen cynicism of imm ense stature from another African-American actor like Morgan Freeman in SEVEN, so Snipes' little bytes of angst seem to amount to nit-picking at the city (about being evicted from his home because some mysterious government body wants to make a parking lo t out of it- it does connect to the plot somehow, but not quite enough to be forgiven). The screenwriters try to give Regis more personality by making him a sensitive History buff- his home has a sprawling to-scale model of some historic American Civil Wa r battle. But Snipes looks out of place and drowning in the midst of the rolling green model plains that crowd his house (no wonder they want him out of the building!).
We have Nina Chance who's a secret service sharpshooter who used to be a gold medallist Olympics sharpshooter. She is supposed to have a great set of worthy values to live up to as an agent, but she finds the only way to save the situation in MURDER AT 1 600 is to betray them (necessary evils for greater goods... you get the picture). However if you have seen Lane in JUDGE DREDD, you get the idea that she is not an actress, but an action star. And she pulls off all those running, tumbling, jumping and sho oting sequences well, but her : "I have a code!" just goes emphatically bathetic, hollow and a little stilted. This is just an idea about how the script attempts what it cannot handle.
Then we go to the plot : we have a young woman of 25 (who has a job at the White House) named Carla Townes, found murdered in one of the toilets in the White House. Regis is called in to investigate, and the straightforward murder mystery takes some devi ous turns that look cliched but interesting. There are hints of a cover-up deep in the Secret Service and Internal Security (smaking a little of ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN). The Secret Service blocks Regis' efforts at every turn and he is unable to piece the whole picture together. Nina Chance is assigned to Regis, but is of no help to him initially since her "code" will not allow her to reveal any information. There is also an illicit love affair between Carla Townes and the president's son, and at some odd moments, it hints even the president himself is involved (smacking of NO WAY OUT and ABSOLUTE POWER).
But somehow, even with all these in place, MURDER AT 1600 can't decide where it wants to go. It disappointingly dives into the conventional action-thriller. There is a race against time to stop a mysterious deep and dark plot from realising itself (the t urn at the end IS a little unexpected... but very farcical, because it involves Alan Alda, who can't shake this comic tone of voice carried from TV's M*A*S*H). And the conclusion doesn't even throw the action-packed punch of DROPZONE. All we get is Regis running around the White House trying to save the President (he beats up a few people in a lift), but gets handcuffed and forced to the floor. At this point, helpless and incapacitated, he starts reading the bad guy his rights (you have the right to remai n silent, if you give up...), firmly believing he has got the upper hand (which visually, against an unrestrained bad guy, he hasn't got in the least bit). It's all rather funny as the movie winds up : the conclusion tries to weave Regis' eviction subplot back into the picture but while something you can grin at, it's not enough to let you forgive the show.
One interesting thing though, poor maligned Carla Townes at age 25 is consistently referred to as a child, a mere baby (twice is enough notable times to be referring to someone dead). This reminds me of a speculative article I once read (the writer of wh ich I have blissfully forgotten the name of), which theorised that Americans were growing less willing to take on adulthood responsibilities, pushing the perceived span of adolescence all the way until age 30. No wonder Carla Townes is a baby... undevelop ed as a character and a functional piece in the film. No wonder Regis and Chance also are undecided as characters, without having grown up somehow into personalities we can pinpoint for unmistakable traits and sensitive layers of character. No wonder the plot twists and turns trying to find itself like the throes of adolescence. No wonder... none of them want to grow up... all half-baked adolescents.
A little less than spectacular. Not a pretty sight.
Wen-Qing hopes that George Lucas will not let Ewan McGregor play young Obi-Wan, it just doesn't feel like the Force is strong in this one... then again...
* Wait for the TV2 broadcast.
** A little creaky, but still better than staying at home with Gotcha!
*** Pretty good, bring a friend.
**** Amazing, potent stuff.
***** Perfection. See it twice.
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