apratt@iuvax.UUCP (10/22/84)
I'm afraid I'm not much at reviewing movies, but I saw this one last night,
and I was sorely disappointed. I believe this kind of thing is called a "hot
idea" in Hollywood: something you can write on the back of somebody's
business card: "Thief steals woman's journals (full of fantasies). Makes them
come true, but she's dissatisfied." That really is all there is to this movie.
The other "characters" are Husband, Husband's Friend, Wife's Friend, and
Thief's Friend. All are two- or one-dimensional, serving only their purpose
to this thin storyline, without actually adding anything (except some comic
relief from the Husband's Friend, and sado-masochistic relief from Thief's
Friend :-).
At each turn, the moviemaking here is cheap. Cheap suspense, cheap mystery,
cheap romance, cheap romance-on-the-rocks (coupled with especially bad
motivation for that), even cheap violence and marital strife. The movie is
predictable from the start, and the twists are old-hat ("Which of the two
people wearing ski masks got shot?").
I felt manipulated by the director, and not pleasantly so. In one case, the
limited frame of the camera provides suspense which does not exist among the
characters. That's what I call cheap suspense.
No characters, thin plot, transparent suspense and mystery, cheap directing,
and some great shots of San Fransisco and the Bay. From what you see in the
ad, you can imagine a far better film. Don't waste your money. No stars.
One interesting point which this film makes was already made in net.women,
in the discussion of rape fantasies. What a person fantisizes about and
what a person would like to have happen to him/her are two different things.
I get a feeling that a better movie was left on the cutting-room floor.
-- Allan Pratt
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