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Crane, a top criminal lawyer (with the emphasis on criminal),
rapes his new secretary and then arranges to have her killed
when she threatens to destroy his new posting as a judge.
Nathan, a young man just released from jail for car theft,
gets the job. He is looking for his real father who happens
to be the lawyer, and befriends two women, one of whom happens
to be the rape victim. Before even learning the identity of
his target, Nathan decides not to go through with it, but
an associate who desperately needs the money takes the down-payment
and carries out the hit. When Nathan arrives too late to save
her, he is blamed for the murder...
Were
you paying attention there, because I'll be asking questions
later. The fact is the above describes just part of this intricate
plot. There are more twists and turns in this movie than...
well, a twisty-turny thing. None of the action really succeeds
in pulling off a surprise, and you can't help feeling that
it's too predictable. However, the performances are strong
and the pace rockets along, pulling you with it. Even the
commercial rock songs mix well with the incidental music,
all of which suit the mood of the piece well.
Behind
the majority of the scheming is Crane, who manipulates most
of the other characters into acting out his own private puppet
show. He steers the hitman into the lap of gangsters, sends
his illegitimate son into a police trap, and even manages
a convenient divorce with his wife. But the reason why there
is no such thing as the perfect murder is nobody can possibly
foresee all events; there's always a random factor which materialises
to confound the best planning, and that's what we get here.
In
short then, a movie with far too many convenient coincidences,
which nevertheless succeeds in putting its story across well.
Ty
Power
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