Problem: OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive negative
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Answer: This is a low-budget spoof of the espionage genre. To help frame your expectations, you should know that: (1) The acting is wildly heavy-handed. The stars are having great fun delivering their lines with excessive eye movement, frequent hand gestures, and off-key pacing. (2) The script deliberately lacks continuity and plausibility. Oftentimes lines are abruptly jarring and humorous because they have absolutely no relevance to previous plot elements. (3) Shots are frequently framed in off-balance angles, poking fun at genre excesses. (4) A pop-eyed Jeff Goldblum delivers complex and classically preposterous dialog in a winningly sarcastic manner.

The film has a guiding intelligence, deliberately starting with a plot element stolen from the B-films of the 1930's: a secret code with a structure that would defy explanation by Carl Sagan. The film's over-the-top acting is used mostly for comic effect during the first 90 minutes. In an early running gag, Fay Grim's son Ned is so frequently told to leave that you can't help chuckling while feeling sorry for the lad. Parker Posey's nicely choreographed fall from bed also helps set a humorous tone early in the film.

The film's slow pacing does not enhance the comedy elements or the drama elements that later emerge. The film's impact as drama is significantly lessened by the early comedy. Moreover, it is hard to be overly involved with the characters and their fates when the early portions of the film are so sarcastic. The musical score is intentionally heavy handed, and I found this (and the off-kilter camera angles) more irritating than humorous.

The over-the-top acting, the implausible and nearly incomprehensible plot of conspiracies/counter conspiracies, and the slow pacing will grind on many viewers. The movie is much too long at 158 minutes.

That said, fans who are receptive to the film's sarcasm might want to watch again ... using closed captioning to best catch the intelligent ridiculousness of the dialog. The film was too slow for me and the sarcasm felt more heavy-handed than light-hearted. But, the comedy may well appeal to your tastes. The film is worth a view for those who enjoy independent films, fans of director Hal Harley, or devotees of Parker Posey (who has the most camera time).
An example of a movie review. positive (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive).

A: An excellent example of "cowboy noir", as it's been called, in which unemployed Michael (Nicolas Cage) loses out on a job because he insists on being honest (he's got a bum leg). With really nothing else he can do, he decides that for once he's going to lie. When he walks into a bar, and the owner Wayne (the late, great J.T. Walsh) mistakes him for a hit-man whom Wayne has hired to do in his sexy young wife Suzanne (Lara Flynn Boyle in fine form), Michael plays along and accepts Waynes' money. *Then* he goes to Suzanne and informs her of her husbands' intentions, and accepts *her* money to get rid of Wayne! If that didn't complicate things enough, the real hit-man, "Lyle from Dallas" (Dennis Hopper, in a perfect role for him) shows up and Michael is in even more trouble than before.

"Red Rock West" gets a lot out of the locations. Director John Dahl, who co-wrote the script with his brother Rick, was smart in realizing the potential of a story set in a truly isolated small town that may have seen better days and in which the residents could be involved in any manner of schemes. It's also an amusing idea of the kind of trouble an honest person could get into if they decided to abandon their principles and give in to any level of temptation. It's an appreciably dark and twist-laden story with an assortment of main characters that are if not corrupt, have at least been morally compromised like Michael. The lighting by cinematographer Marc Reshovsky is superb in its moodiness; even the climax set in a graveyard lends a nice morbid quality to the whole thing. Even if the writing isn't particularly "logical or credible", the film has a nice way of intriguing the viewer and just drawing them right in.

Cage does a good job in the lead, but his co-stars have a grand old time sinking their teeth into their meaty and greed-motivated characters. Hopper, Boyle, and Walsh are all fun to watch in these parts. Timothy Carhart and Dan Shor are fine as Walshs' deputies (in one especially good twist, Walsh is also the local sheriff), and there's an entertaining cameo role for country & western star Dwight Yoakam, who also graces the film with an enjoyable end credits tune.

It's quite a good little film worth checking out. It moves forward at an impressive pace, and if nothing else is certainly never boring.

8/10
Q: What's an example of a movie review?
An example of a movie review is here: Poor Ivy: Though to the manner born, she had the bad luck to marry a charming wastrel (Richard Ney). As the movie is set in the 20s or 30s, when rigid Victorian ideas of class were starting to fray at the edges, this uncertain status vexes her unduly. The Gretorexes (for so they are called) don't know where their next shilling is coming from but there are yachting parties and fancy-dress balls in posh pleasaunces aplenty to tempt her. When Ivy (Joan Fontaine) makes the acquaintance of a wealthy older gent (Herbert Marshall, who must have been born middle-aged), she sets one of her extravant chapeaux for him. Luckily, one of the beaux she still strings along (Patric Knowles) is a physician whose consulting rooms provide a cache of poison, with which she bids her hubby farewell. The fact that it implicates Knowles doesn't phase her a bit, even as the hours trickle by until he should be hanged by the neck until dead. The turning of the plot depends on police inspector Sir Cedric Hardwicke; Knowles' mother (the redoubtable Lucile Watson); and Knowles' loyal housekeeper (Una O'Connor). Sam Wood adds some subtle touches to this well above average melodrama; Fontaine's luminous face supplies the rest.
Problem: OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive negative
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Answer:
The only remarkable fact is the participation of Klaus Kinski who plays a priest. Don't ask me why he does it! A bad, bad movie overall.