IF LOOKS COULD KILL
A film review by Frank Maloney
Copyright 1991 Frank Maloney
IF LOOKS COULD KILL, starring Richard Grieco, will be a very amusing $2 rental in the video store. At $3.50 matinee rates, it still provided some honest laughs but I cannot recommend it to anyone who can wait a while (a short while judging from the three other people in the auditorium at the Friday 5 PM showing) to see this personable, hunky guy with great pecs and good definition in the tummy spend a five-minute scene in rather abbreviated jockey shorts. Obviously, I couldn't.
The movie, which hardly merits a serious review, is a parody of secret-agent flicks and especially of GOLDFINGER, my favorite Bond movie. Like the old Punch cartoon of the country vicar being served bad eggs by his bishop: "Parts are excellent." And indeed, the movie romps along powered by the idea of a wise-guy going to France with his French-teacher-from-Hell and the French Club to make up his French class; he is immediately mistaken for Secret Agent Man who in the first of many coincidences has assumed the same name as the Grieco character. The bad guys include Linda Hunt, having a lot of fun with a bad German accent and a gold whip that does double duty as her necklace.
The scene where Grieco tours the weapons lab and get his shiny new gadgets including a Bondian sports car is pretty rich. Unfortunately, the movie slows down occasionally to take itself a little seriously, to introduce the love element, and to make room for a couple of MTV videos. The woman who plays the French teacher is rather wonderful as is the madman intent on stealing all the gold in Europe, Hunt's boss (?).
Also unfortunate is the skimpy special effects budget and enough editing errors to fuel r.a.m. for a year.
Look for it next month.
-- Frank Richard Aloysius Jude Maloney
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