John Cusack, Gene Hackman, Dustin Hoffman, Rachel Weisz
This tense thriller is a reasonably intelligent, colorfully acted, entertaining-enough-to-warrant-going-out-on-a-Saturday-night movie. Runaway Jury, based on a 1996 novel by lawyer-turned-megaselling-author John Grisham, won't end up on 2003's 10 Best lists, but it isn't trying for that kind of impact. Rather, Jury aims—and succeeds—at keeping viewers guessing what's going to happen next.
The designated evildoers here are so-called "jury experts"—the folks paid lavishly to advise attorneys on which potential jurors to pick in hopes of landing a desired verdict. "Trials are too important to be left up to juries," sniffs Rankin Fitch (Hackman), the film's slickly villainous jury consultant. Rankin soon rues that he didn't advocate dumping juror Nick Easter (Cusack) from a big-money case against his corporate client, a gun manufacturer, in New Orleans. Easter, for reasons that won't become clear until near the end, tells both sides through an intermediary (Weisz) that he can swing the verdict for $10 million. Will either Fitch or the liberal lawyer (Hoffman) who's suing meet Easter's price?
Director Gary Fleder (Don't Say a Word) keeps the story moving briskly so that one doesn't have time to focus on its improbabilities, but he also shows the good sense to pause periodically to give Hoffman and Hackman, two of Hollywood's wiliest vets, time to judiciously chew scenery. As the seemingly morally ambivalent hero, Cusack delivers a canny turn. (PG-13)
LEGAL THRILLER
Katie Holmes, Patricia Clarkson, Oliver Platt, Derek Luke
CRITIC'S CHOICE
Though shot for less than $200,000 (probably one-eighth of what Quentin Tarantino spent on fake blood alone for Kill Bill Vol. 1), this perceptive comedy about a dysfunctional family's wacky attempt at a Thanksgiving meal demonstrates that if a filmmaker can create characters and a story that draw you in, a movie's look becomes decidedly secondary.
Director-writer Peter Hedges (who wrote 1993's What's Eating Gilbert Grape) toggles between bohemian April's (Holmes) inept efforts at whipping up a holiday meal in her grungy Manhattan digs and the comic adventures of her family while they are driving in from the suburbs. Adding poignancy, April's mother (Clarkson), from whom she has long been estranged, is dying of cancer. Both know this is their last chance to connect before it's too late.
Holmes and castmates are swell, but Clarkson is sublime. She conveys the dark humor and heartbreak of one who knows only too well that her time is near. (PG-13)
COMEDY
Cate Blanchett, Gerard McSorley
Veronica Guerin was a tenacious investigative reporter in Dublin who in 1996, while waiting in her car for a traffic light to change, was fatally gunned down by the henchmen of a drug lord she had exposed. There had been threats and even a bullet fired at her before, but Guerin refused to back down.
Her story is told and her relentless drive is examined in Veronica Guerin, a compelling though standard biopic lit up by Blanchett's passionate, quicksilver performance in the title role. Although obviously admiring of Guerin, director Joel Schumacher (Phone Booth) and Blanchett don't present her as perfect. Guerin knew that by continuing to dig into the drug trade, she was endangering herself and possibly her husband and young son. But some stories should be told, including this one. (R)
BIOPIC
Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig
Shortly after his wedding, rising English poet Ted Hughes is shown giving a lecture. His American wife, fellow writer Sylvia Plath (The Bell Jar), enters the room just as he's quoting a telling line of verse by W.B. Yeats: "And with you came the whole of the world's tears." The words ring sadly true, both for their doomed marriage and this downer of a biographical movie. It's not as if the ending—Plath killed herself at 30 in 1963 by sticking her head in the gas oven of her London flat—is ever in doubt.
Sylvia, sympathetically directed by Christine Jeffs (Rain), concentrates on the seven troubled years that Hughes (Craig), England's future poet laureate, and Plath (Paltrow) spent together. The film, almost frustratingly, doesn't take sides in their squabbling. Both are shown to have their reasons. Hughes makes an effort, at least at first, but Plath, aching endlessly for the father who died when she was 9, is never going to be happy for long. Paltrow, wearing frowsy wigs and moping most of the time, misses here, never quite connecting with the role. (R)
BIOPIC
Jessica Biel, Andrew Bryniarski
The five young folk traveling across Texas in this remake of the 1974 cheapie horror classic start screaming in terror early and often. With good reason: First, a woman they've given a lift to blows her brains out in their van after declaring, "You're all going to die." Then a large, silent masked fellow known in these parts as Leatherface (Bryniarski) revs up his chainsaw and starts chasing them as fast as his lumbering gait will allow.
Did anyone really need a remake of the original? No. Is this new Massacre—which tells pretty much the same story of pointless murder and mayhem as the first one, only with more dopey dialogue and less backstory—an improvement? Nah again, but it is sharper-looking given that first-time director Marcus Nispel honed his chops making ads and music videos. Is there any reason for adults to go see it? Nope, unless they're comparison shopping for chainsaws. (R)
SLASHER
Vivica A. Fox
Divorced from rapper Sixx-Nine but dating rapper 50 Cent (she must love numbers), Vivica A. Fox, 39, dishes out punishment as an assassin in Kill Bill Vol. 1.
ON PREPARING FOR THE FILM: We were working out like we were going to be in the Olympics. We did tae kwon do, weightlifting, choreography. I was ripped. I went from a size 8 to a 4.
ON THE LOVING MARTIAL ARTS MOVIES AS A KID: I was a big Bruce Lee fan. He was the finest Asian man I'd ever seen. I was a tomboy, and I have two older brothers. We'd go to wrestling matches. I got put in a lot of head- locks. And I got used to fighting back.
ON THE BLACK PEOPLE DYING FIRST IN MOVIES: I told [director] Quentin Tarantino that he might get flak. But the wonderful thing about this movie is that every girl gets whipped. The fact I went first—don't take it personally.
ON DATING 50 CENT, 27: We have a blossoming, wonderful friendship. Does the age difference bother us? Not at all. I've asked him. [He says] "Nope. Look at you, you look 28, girl, damn." He's awesome. He keeps me young. BOB MEADOWS
- Contributors:
- Leah Rozen.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
