nbrenner
Lifetime Total
1+
IMDb Member
23 years
Reviews
Camarate (2001)
Intriguing conspiracy theory, but feeble drama
In 1980, a small plane carrying the Prime Minister, the Defense Minister and six others crashed during takeoff in Camarate, Portugal, killing all on board. The police investigation decided it was an accident caused by pilot error. But controversy raged for twenty years, and the Parliament investigated it no less than six times. Finally, in 2000, in response to a suit by the families of the survivors, the High Court had to decide whether to open a criminal investigation, or close the case forever.
So much is fact. This movie is a fictional account of how one judge might have made a decision on the case. Effective use is made of extracts from the official records, pointing out the contradictions, implausibilities and inadequacies of the police inquiry. The film "The Thin Blue Line" visually reenacted such points. "All the President's Men" and "JFK" implied similar points inside a framework of true-life events. Instead, here they are merely recited by one character to another within a dreary (and, the introduction states, invented) soap-opera storyline.
The judge allocated to the case is a woman, and the audience is supposed to be entertained by her personal dilemmas--jealous tension between her ex-husband and her current lover, and whether she should get an abortion or not. Other characters are one dimensional at best--the law professor who balances the conflicting investigations, the fellow judge who is both a conspiracy theorist and a would-be "Deep Throat". A clandestine meeting at a spectacular aquarium only serves as a metaphor for a fish-eat-fish sort of world. Lastly, in the print I viewed, the subtitles were too often projected against white backgrounds, making them invisible.
I discussed the movie's various hypotheses with someone familiar with air crash investigations. He reserved judgement on the pilot's actions, since that is mere speculation, and dismissed the various witnesses's claims of a bright light before the crash, since witnesses often confuse the sequence of events. But he did say that the trail of burned wreckage the plane left behind, if it truly existed, might provide indications whether a mid-air explosion occurred.
So much is fact. This movie is a fictional account of how one judge might have made a decision on the case. Effective use is made of extracts from the official records, pointing out the contradictions, implausibilities and inadequacies of the police inquiry. The film "The Thin Blue Line" visually reenacted such points. "All the President's Men" and "JFK" implied similar points inside a framework of true-life events. Instead, here they are merely recited by one character to another within a dreary (and, the introduction states, invented) soap-opera storyline.
The judge allocated to the case is a woman, and the audience is supposed to be entertained by her personal dilemmas--jealous tension between her ex-husband and her current lover, and whether she should get an abortion or not. Other characters are one dimensional at best--the law professor who balances the conflicting investigations, the fellow judge who is both a conspiracy theorist and a would-be "Deep Throat". A clandestine meeting at a spectacular aquarium only serves as a metaphor for a fish-eat-fish sort of world. Lastly, in the print I viewed, the subtitles were too often projected against white backgrounds, making them invisible.
I discussed the movie's various hypotheses with someone familiar with air crash investigations. He reserved judgement on the pilot's actions, since that is mere speculation, and dismissed the various witnesses's claims of a bright light before the crash, since witnesses often confuse the sequence of events. But he did say that the trail of burned wreckage the plane left behind, if it truly existed, might provide indications whether a mid-air explosion occurred.
Framed (1992)
A mixed bag
* * * WARNING -- POSSIBLE SPOILERS * * *
Timothy Dalton plays a major criminal, captured by the British police, who is "grassing" (informing) on his confederates to avoid a long sentence. On one side of the action, he plays cat and mouse mindgames with his young, inexperienced police interrogator; on the other, his ex-gang is desperate to kill him before he spills too much. While the grittiness and police procedure are pluses, Dalton is much too glossy to play a criminal. His movie star good looks clash startlingly with the realistic, plain countenances of the cops (and the robbers!). Much of the middle of the movie is claustrophobic, taking place underground in one of the police safe cells. Worst of all, several major plot threads are left dangling at the "surprise" conclusion, including the fate of the chain-smoking chief inspector, and the total disappearance of the hovering bad-guy assassins. It looks almost as tho Lynda LaPlante's script was intended for a miniseries, and it was violently abbreviated to fit it into a feature film.
2 1/2 stars out of 5.
Timothy Dalton plays a major criminal, captured by the British police, who is "grassing" (informing) on his confederates to avoid a long sentence. On one side of the action, he plays cat and mouse mindgames with his young, inexperienced police interrogator; on the other, his ex-gang is desperate to kill him before he spills too much. While the grittiness and police procedure are pluses, Dalton is much too glossy to play a criminal. His movie star good looks clash startlingly with the realistic, plain countenances of the cops (and the robbers!). Much of the middle of the movie is claustrophobic, taking place underground in one of the police safe cells. Worst of all, several major plot threads are left dangling at the "surprise" conclusion, including the fate of the chain-smoking chief inspector, and the total disappearance of the hovering bad-guy assassins. It looks almost as tho Lynda LaPlante's script was intended for a miniseries, and it was violently abbreviated to fit it into a feature film.
2 1/2 stars out of 5.