JADE
A film review by Michael John Legeros
Copyright 1995 Michael John Legeros
(Par) Directed by William Friedkin Written by Joe Eszterhas Cast David Caruso, Linda Fiorentino, Chazz Palminteri, Michael Biehn, Richard Crenna Running Time Too Long MPAA Rating "R" (Presumably for sex, violence, and profanity) Reviewed at Mission Valley Cinemas, Raleigh, NC (14OCT95)
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"I do the fucking, I never get fucked."
- Richard Crenna
It takes talent to write a movie that's even less impressive than SHOWGIRLS. Heaven help us, but original scribe Joe Eszterhas has done just that. Hollywood's [choose one: horniest/hairiest/highest-paid] writer has concocted a "psychological thriller" that's even more absurd than his last month's appearance on "Larry King Live." The plot--a District Attorney caught in a love triangle with a murder suspect--is so convoluted that even director William Friedkin (THE FRENCH CONNECTION) is reduced to copying car chases from better movies. And you thought killer lesbians were bad? Try Linda Fiorentino as a clinical psychologist moonlighting as a high-class hooker! ["But he won't take the medicine, Doctor."]
JADE is a loss and barely worth the breath to balk at. Like that other guy, Eszterhas will be acquitted soon enough. He'll work in this town again. (Though maybe no longer without a rewrite!) If there's *any* fun to be had, it's imagining how the Hirsute One would've adapted THE SCARLET LETTER. Let's see ... a blonde Hester Prynne brutally murders the Reverend Dimmesdale after he discovers her lesbian love affair with Harriet Hibbins. For her punishment, she's sold to the Indians and forced to perform nightly at the New World's newest nightspot, the Totem Pole.
Who's to say what's a sin in Joe's eyes?
Grade: D
-- Michael J. Legeros - Raleigh, NC legeros@nando.net (h) - legeros@unx.sas.com (w)
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