Depressing film with one good message.

Rating: Null/10 (24 July 2000)

SPOILER ALERT >A film well directed and acted by everyone involved. The story line, though, is less than it should be. The death at the end was totally unnecessary. And once again the "bad guy" is a government figure, this time a Colonel in the military. Enough already. Hollywood script writers--it is time to lay the blame of our social problems totally where they belong: on us, the everyday people. Stop using government conspirators and convenient right wing villains as scapegoats who are given no personalities and are presented as stick figures. They are not acceptable any more. I certainly don't buy it. But there is one underlying message that comes through clearly enough, and it almost justifies the film. That is, with our obsession with obtaining "things". we have lost the real reason we should live: for the genuine concern of others. This is well stated, but gets a bit lost when one thinks of Ricky Fitts' drug dealings being condoned, and of his father, who Ricky at one point said, 'was a good man', being portrayed as a closet homosexual and a murderer. That a movie that portrays hate within families, like this one did, can find any redeeming value whatsoever says something I guess. I rate it good, worth seeing, but could have been so much better.