From: sbb@panix.com (The Phantom)
Subject: REVIEW: BODY OF EVIDENCE
Reply-To: sbb@panix.com (The Phantom)
Organization: PANIX Public Access Unix, NYC
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 17:59:52 GMT
Followup-To: rec.arts.movies
Summary: r.a.m.r. #01714
Keywords: author=Phantom

			   BODY OF EVIDENCE
		    A review in the public domain
			    by The Phantom
			   (sbb@panix.com)

     In his last review, the Phantom wrote of the importance of heeding
the warnings of impending cinematic doom that we may find on the way to
the opening credits of yet another quality-challenged horror or
exploitation film.  Occasionally the filmmakers or the studio will give
us tantalizing hints of the extreme violence about to be done to our
high expectations; but oftentimes we must rely on a combination of some
of our less discerning film critics and the studio's publicity
department to provide us with suitably frightening theatrical portents
-- the cinematic equivalents of "Bridge Out" signs that we overlook at
our own peril.

     As is the case with BODY OF EVIDENCE, the subject of this review
and the latest in a peculiarly Hollywood combination of sex, violence
and litigation that reached its apex with Paul Verhoeven's now infamous
BASIC INSTINCT.  Even before it opened, the print ads for Dino De
Laurentiis' latest attempt to recapture the box-office glory of his
not-particularly-good masterpiece, the 1977 remake of KING KONG, gave us
an inkling of what was to come.  "BE WARNED: It's not for the prudish or
faint-hearted" screamed Susan Granger's quote, used by Metro Goldwyn
Mayer's publicity department perhaps in an attempt to mislead us into
thinking that we would be seeing Bram Stoker's BODY OF EVIDENCE instead
of good old Dino's.  Since then, MGM has reconsidered the value of
displaying prominently a reviewer's quote that warns people away from a
film, rather than recommends it to them.  On the brighter side, since no
one has ever heard of Susan Granger (credited as a reviewer for
WICC/American Movie Classics), her dire warnings seem to have had little
effect on the all-important first weekend gross.  "A slick thriller that
embodies elements of WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION, THE STORY OF O, and
BASIC INSTINCT," reads David Ansen's quote, excerpted from his Newsweek
review.  This is better, at least from MGM's point of view, since it
only serves to confuse people rather than warn them away from the film.
But what must it do to those few people who had any respect for Mr.
Ansen's critical sensibilities?  After all, such shameless flaking for
what is universally understood to be an extremely bad film can't be
earning him any brownie points with the editors of his august
publication.  Ansen, after all, has never exactly been King of the
Critics, but still: WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION, THE STORY OF O, and
BASIC INSTINCT!?  After reading that quote (and enduring BODY OF
EVIDENCE), the Phantom spent quite a while trying to determine just what
these four films had in common.  At last it occurred to him: they were
all filmed in color!  But no, not even that: Marlene Dietrich wasn't
making color films in the fifties (though in WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION
she was sexier fully dressed and filmed in black and white than Madonna
will ever be nude and pouring hot candle wax all over Willem Dafoe in
glorious Technicolor).

     We may never know what "elements" Ansen was referring to.  Phans
who have seen all four films are encouraged to send their best guesses
to the Phantom; he, in turn, will reply with his heartfelt sympathies
for having endured Madonna's latest cinematic fiasco (perhaps on Mr.
Ansen's ever-reliable recommendation) and a recommendation of his own:
that they race to their nearest Blockbusters and rent Billy Wilder's
classic adaptation of Agatha Christie's suspenseful, well-written, and
thoroughly enjoyable play.  WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION is every bit as
good as BODY OF EVIDENCE is bad; it is also worth seeing for the second
or third time just as much as BODY OF EVIDENCE is worth avoiding for the
first.

     Having gotten his fellow critics' ill-considered reviews out of the
way, the Phantom will now make some attempt to describe just how bad,
how incompetent, how completely hilarious Madonna's latest film really
is.  Nothing you have seen or read can prepare you for the unceasing
onslaught of just plain lousiness that Madonna, Willem Dafoe, Joe
Mantegna, writer Brad Mirman, and director Uli Edel unleash upon their
audience; truly, it is awe-inspiring to leave a theater thinking to
oneself, "You know, BASIC INSTINCT wasn't that bad after all.  A little
goofy, maybe, and we sure could have done without seeing Michael
Douglas' naked rear-end a half-dozen times, but at least Verhoeven had
some idea what he was doing."  (Phans, cinematic revisionism through
Madonna-tinted glasses is the most dangerous kind, but even the Phantom
found himself engaging in it before the candle wax had finished dripping
all over Dafoe.)

     The story revolves around Madonna's character, Rebecca Carlson, who
is put on trial for the murder of the wealthy older man she had been
rather friendly with right up until the moment he had a fatal heart
attack.  Was Rebecca simply too much for the old man?  Was she herself
the "lethal weapon" that caused his untimely (and rather embarrassing)
death?  As the crackerjack prosecutor Robert Garrett, Joe Mantegna sets
out to prove just this.  Naturally, Rebecca needs an equally crackerjack
defense, and that she gets from Willem Dafoe as Frank Dulaney, a man who
we know is doomed to buzz around the incandescent beauty of his client
like a moth around an outdoor patio light.

     But one immediate problem with the film is that even a dim and
faltering patio light gives off more heat than either Madonna or Dafoe,
both of whom are grievously miscast here.  (Joe Mantegna is never
miscast, but he does manage to sleepwalk though his role as Portland's
least competent prosecutor.  After having seen the film, the Phantom can
hardly blame him, but oh how he must be kicking himself for turning down
the chance to reprise his starring role in GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS for the
opportunity to be the best supporting actor in yet another Madonna
turkey.)  Dafoe, as the equally incompetent Frank Dulaney, does better
with intellectual roles than those that require that he respond with
unbridled enthusiasm when someone unzips his fly in an elevator; he is
simply all wrong for Dulaney, who is first and foremost a character with
very little common sense and not much more intelligence.  (And $7.50
later, the Phantom considered the possibility that he himself might be
perfect for the role; nothing like wasting one's money on a film like
BODY OF EVIDENCE to make one doubt one's own common sense, intelligence,
and at times, sanity.)

     Madonna may have seen something in Rebecca that was just right for
her, but a role in which Madonna does little more than act like Madonna
is not what any of us need.  Her role as Rebecca invites comparisons to
Sharon Stone's similar role in BASIC INSTINCT, but Madonna does not, at
this point, have Sharon Stone's looks; in fact, she doesn't really have
Sharon Stone's talent, though she's probably a better singer, and she's
certainly better at self-promotion.  Madonna plays much better when she
puts herself at the center of a fantasy -- her videos all have her
play-acting in worlds where every element reflects back favorably on
her, and in which she controls the words, the music, and the images we
see -- not when she has to try to play a real person who interacts with
other real people in the real world (or as real as the world ever gets
in a film as loopy as BODY OF EVIDENCE).  In this film, however, she
doesn't even look particularly good: she's given an unflattering hair
style, frumpy-looking clothes, terrible lighting, and bad direction.  As
a result, she seems more like a mannequin come to life than a sex siren
who lures Frank to the rocks of professional ruin and personal danger.
Though even this is a bad comparison, as most mannequins are better
dressed and almost never say anything as inane as "They've taken
something good between two people in love and made it dirty."

     To make matters worse, half the film is set in a courtroom, always
a dangerous thing for a writer to do if he cannot, in fact, write
intelligent dialogue.  The dialogue in BODY OF EVIDENCE is about on the
level of Matlock, and frequently it's much worse.  As the trial gets
under way, we quickly find that the judge (ably played by Lillian
Lehman) appears to be in the same position we are: she's fed up with the
way things are going, she most adamantly does not want to tolerate any
more bad dialogue from either lawyer, and she's going to do everything
in her power to see that her portion of the film ends as quickly as
possible.  Alas, it is only the audience who can hold the filmmakers in
contempt, and even we cannot sentence them to repeated viewings of the
hundreds of more intelligent, better acted, and better directed
courtroom dramas that have been made over the years.  (Including WITNESS
FOR THE PROSECUTION, as Mr.  Ansen may know, a film with sparkling
dialogue by Billy Wilder and crackling courtroom scenes that are reason
enough for Brad Mirman to hide his head in shame.)  Apparently the best
the judge can do is look positively dyspeptic at frequent intervals and
wonder how director Uli Edel could have fallen so far from his very
solid 1989 adaptation of LAST EXIT TO BROOKLYN, and how we all could
have fallen so far from Jennifer Jason Leigh's stunning performance in
that film to Madonna's stunted one in this.
  Of course, there are the obligatory sex scenes, this time sans
ice-pick.  But also, alas, sans emotion and sans interest on our part.
Though there is a lot of fumbling around in the film, there are two main
scenes responsible for the film's notoriety: one in which Rebecca ties
up Frank with his own belt and pours hot candle wax on him; and one in
which she makes love to him in a parking garage, on top of a car, fully
clothed, and while Dulaney is lying on top of broken glass.  Dafoe is
way outside his element in each scene, and Madonna approaches them as if
she were following a particularly complicated chapter in the Time-Life
Guide to Offbeat Sexual Practices.  (Order now and we'll send you "How
to Turn Off the Lights By Breaking the Bulb With Your Shoe Instead of
Using the Switch Like People In a More Plausible Film Would" as our free
gift to you.)  The Phantom had hoped that Madonna might accidentally
open the guide to home repairs and show us all how to replace bathroom
tile or install a new dishwasher but, sadly, he was repeatedly
disappointed.  At least she looked like she was enjoying herself; Dafoe
tended to look like someone who got talked onto a rollercoaster against
his better judgment, just as the safety bars come down and the car
begins its ascent.  He knows he's in for something; he knows it won't be
pleasant; and it's only the thought of the wholesale retribution to come
that keeps him in the scene -- after all, tossing your agent out the
window isn't even a felony in California.

     We have all traveled a long and hard road from the heights of
WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION to the depths of BODY OF EVIDENCE, from
Marlene Dietrich to Madonna.  It is conceivable that BODY OF EVIDENCE
could be even worse than it is, but only if it weren't so
unintentionally funny so very often; how it got to be in the sorry shape
in which it is presented to us will likely never be known.  For the
Phantom's part, he still finds it hard to believe that so many
reasonably talented people could together produce a film as
mind-numbingly bad as BODY OF EVIDENCE, though Dino De Laurentiis' Midas
touch should always be kept in mind.  In the meantime, Billy Wilder's
classic film awaits you at your local Blockbusters.  No handcuffs; no
hot candle wax; no contempt for the audience -- just top-flight acting,
unparalleled writing, and Marlene Dietrich with all her clothes on.  A
film that looked good then looks even better now that we are able to see
it through our Madonna-tinted glasses.

: The Phantom
: sbb@panix.com

Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies.reviews