SPEECHLESS
A film review by James Berardinelli
Copyright 1994 James Berardinelli
RATING (0 TO 10): 4.8
Date Released: 12/16/94 Running Length: 1:38 Rated: PG-13 (Language, mature themes)
Starring: Michael Keaton, Geena Davis, Bonnie Bedelia, Christopher Reeve,
Ernie Hudson, Charles Martin Smith
Director: Ron Underwood
Producers: Renny Harlin and Geena Davis
Screenplay: Robert King
Cinematography: Don Peterman
Music: Marc Shaiman
Released by MGM
The story told in SPEECHLESS is not unlike the one played out during the real life 1992 Presidential campaign when the romance between James Carville (Democrat) and Mary Matalin (Republican) crossed party lines. Those who saw THE WAR ROOM or any of the news shows documenting the relationship will doubtless find something familiar in this Michael Keaton/Geena Davis coupling (although, to be fair, SPEECHLESS was written while Ronald Reagan was still in the Oval Office). Nevertheless, an unwelcome ingredient has been added to this fictional account of rival political speech writers falling in love: hogwash.
SPEECHLESS is overplotted and underwritten. Every situation is straight out of stock, with no room for variation or originality. The two leads--Kevin Vallick (Keaton) and Julia Mann (Davis)--meet, are attracted to each other, find out they're on opposite sides of the New Mexico senatorial campaign, spend half the movie sparring with each other, then eventually get together. It's the "Taming of the Shrew" romantic comedy formula. Opposites, after all, are supposed to attract.
Alas, too much of SPEECHLESS feels hopelessly forced. The dialogue isn't memorable, the verbal jabs are mostly bland, and the romance is only sporadically engaging. You probably have to go back to 1992's THE CUTTING EDGE to find a recent mainstream romantic comedy with the same basic plot structure. That film, however, possessed a certain amount of style and subtlety. SPEECHLESS' approach is more of the sledgehammer variety.
As with this past summer's Nick Nolte/Julia Roberts flick NOTHING BUT TROUBLE, perhaps part of the problem is that SPEECHLESS spends too much time concentrating on other things (politics) when it should be exploring the characters' relationship. No one really cares which candidate wins the race--that particular plot element should have been permanently relegated to the background. The only worthwhile scenes are the cute ones involving Kevin and Julia arguing or making up.
In any romantic comedy, the individual performances are far less important than how the leads work as a team. Keaton and Davis have enough chemistry to generate a few sparks, but they're a pale shadow of, say, a Tracy and Hepburn. Bonnie Bedelia and Christopher Reeve are along for the ride to provide relationship complications, and both are woefully underused. As for Ernie Hudson... why bother getting a familiar name for that thankless part?
Ultimately, most problems in SPEECHLESS come back to the script, which, in addition to displaying a remarkable unwillingness to vary the familiar, has a major believability problem. The "grand" climax, while vintage Hollywood, is so silly that it's more likely to cause snickers of laughter than sighs of longing. For SPEECHLESS, if suspension of disbelief was a rubber band, it would have snapped long before the closing credits.
The above represents the opinions of the author, and not necessarily those of Bellcore or any organization within Bellcore.
- James Berardinelli (blake7@cc.bellcore.com)
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