BODY COUNT (1997) A film review by Justin Felix. Copyright 1999 Justin Felix. Any comments about this review? Contact me at justinfelix@yahoo.com All of my film reviews are archived at http://us.imdb.com/M/reviews_by?Justin+Felix
Rating: * (out of five)
Written by David Diamond and Richard Shepard. Directed by Kurt Voss. Starring Alyssa Milano and Ice-T. Rated R (contains violence, profanity, and sexuality) 88 mins.
Synopsis: Nice girl Susanne has sex with her boyfriend Daniel in his car, visits Daniel's rich family during Thanksgiving at their mansion in the middle of nowhere, and has sex with Daniel again in the basement. Susanne and Daniel must then decide where to hide from evil art thieves who shoot everyone else in the mansion to steal paintings. Brace yourself for one of those painfully obvious "surprise endings."
Comments: Thanksgiving. For most, it's a time to be with your loved ones and enjoy a good, home-cooked meal. For the makers of BODY COUNT, however, Thanksgiving is a time for multiple murders, violence, profanity, family dysfunction, and sex. Boy, do I feel all the more better having sat through this crap.
Alyssa Milano, the former child star of WHO'S THE BOSS?, matures to made-for-video sludge like this movie. Someone somewhere thought it'd be a great idea to pair her with rapper Ice-T, who has since guest-starred in the made-for-the-Sci-Fi-Channel series WELCOME TO PARADOX. This isn't exactly a winning combination.
Outside of permanently ruining a holiday for me, what else may be said for this turkey? Well, it teaches us that beautiful, attractive women who look strikingly like Alyssa Milano fall in love with nerds who drive down long winding roads with their eyes closed and complain about being English teachers. It presents us with a heartwarming Thanksgiving dinner attended by alcoholic, stuck-up rich white people waited on by black servants. It shows us that old guys, try not to laugh, sit around and talk about "the appeal of postmodernism" during their free time. And, it proves that you can have sex in your parents' basement when they have a dozen or so guests over, and no one will notice.
Before I go any further, if any young male reading this has hopes of seeing Alyssa naked, forget it. The filmmakers cleverly shoot the simulated sex scenes in a manner that makes sure you don't see any of Milano's attributes. They do, however, inexplicably throw in a scene where Ice-T whistles "Jingle Bells" after killing people, for whatever that's worth.
This film was originally titled BELOW UTOPIA. Perhaps they should have renamed it HELL. Avoid this clunker.
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