HER ALIBI
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1989 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Bruce Beresford (BREAKER MORANT, TENDER MERCIES) turns his hand to a light comedy-mystery whose most severe false steps are when it strays into slapstick. The mystery is predictable. Rating: +1.
Australian director Bruce Beresford is not really someone known for light comedy. The major films he is known for are DON'S PARTY (1976), THE MONEY MOVERS (1978), BREAKER MORANT (1980), and TENDER MERCIES (1982). That is a pretty somber set of films with the possible exception of parts of DON'S PARTY. He certainly is not the first director you would expect to see doing a light, romantic comedy-mystery, but that is just what he is doing in HER ALIBI.
HER ALIBI does not actually start as a light comedy. The police find a murder victim stabbed to death with a pair of scissors and Frank Polito (played by James Farentino) is investigating. We are also introduced to Philip Blackwood (played by Tom Selleck), a mystery writer with a series of eight or so popular mysteries to his name. And eight was about the number of stories he had to tell. For four years he has been trying to squeeze out another without success. Then he sees Nina, a beautiful Romanian woman on trial for murder, and decides to get involved by telling the police that she was with him at the time of the murder. (Do *not* try this trick at home, boys and girls.) Polito knows he is lying and warns him that if she murders Blackwood, the alibi can never be questioned. Blackwood convinces Nina to stay at his house but he is torn between infatuation and suspicion.
Nina is played by the svelte Paulina Porizkova. HER ALIBI also features several familiar actors in roles that less familiar actors could have easily filled. But it is still enjoyable to see the likes of the durable William Daniels (THE GRADUATE. television's CAPTAIN NEMO), Tess Harper, Joan Copeland, and the ever-sinister Hurd Hatfield (THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY).
Beresford has a deft hand with drama but his occasional lapses into slapstick undermine the mood of the film and are neither likable nor believable. Colin Higgins' transitions in the comparable FOUL PLAY were handled much more smoothly. Beresford does manage to turn an impromptu haircut into an extremely sensual sequence which is a little surprising-- considering haircuts, I mean. Another and unfortunately larger sequence involving a cat is merely a dramatization of an old joke.
HER ALIBI is a pleasant lightweight piece of entertainment. Rate it a +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
(FYI: One of my best friends is Romanian. The Romanian spoken in this film has the right words but is still barely recognizable as Romanian.)
Mark R. Leeper
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