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Wednesday, 07 July 2004 |
  I confess, I have a weakness. Well, I have several weaknesses, but the one I'm talking about is my affection for the actress Rachael Leigh Cook (Josie and the Pussycats). Cook has become a darling of the direct-to-video movie business, which means none of her movies is likely to be all that good, but at least they usually aren't awful. So when I noticed the movie American Crime sitting on the shelf and saw that Cook co-starred with Annabella Sciorra (What Dreams May Come) and Cary Elwes (The Princess Bride) I hoped it was a reasonably safe bet. What I learned is, there is a reason I give awful movies like Blade: Trinity two stars rather than being more harsh. I need to allow room to express how much worse something like American Crime is. This movie is so bad, it gives direct to video a bad name.
The story involves an ambitious young reporter, Jesse St. Claire (Cook) at a small town TV station who is investigating the disappearance and murder of young woman in the area. She discovers that the killer was following and videotaping his victims in the days leading up to their killings. She receives several of these videotapes, which motivates her to follow the story, along with her skeptical producer (Sciorra) and a twitchy, overambitious geek (Kip Pardue) who videotapes everything in sight as though he's on his 14th cup of coffee. Eventually, a tape arrives showing St. Claire herself going through her everyday life. She freaks out, quits her job and eventually disappears. Why? Not because it aids the story in any way. Maybe the production company was running out of money.
American Crime is told in a flashback fashion through a segment done by the fictional British TV show American Crime, which is hosted by a human caricature named Albert Bodine (Elwes). The completely bizarre portrayal by Elwes and the comical makeup he is given in an attempt to portray someone in his sixties (Elwes is 42) is the clearest indication that American Crime is intended as a parody, but a parody of what? Most likely it is a Natural Born Killers style satire of how tabloid television and the general public become obsessed with and even grow to worship anyone seen on television, even murderers. The problem is, none of those things actually happens. It is just the story of a handful of people pursuing a shadowy killer. Also missing is the slightest hint of humor, which is rather important in any parody. What is not missing are sequences intended to do nothing but imply every character in the movie is the actual killer, which are run through in an almost assembly line fashion, as though each character was being checked off a list.
Thankfully, American Crime does eventually end, though it ends in true slasher fashion, with no real indication of who it has been pursuing for the last 90 minutes. Possibly it harbors delusions of becoming some sort of Friday the 13th or Nightmare on Elm Street style franchise. Don't count on it. The biggest shame is that when it is so difficult to get many movies financed, not to mention getting decent actors to sign up for them, something like this gets the green light.
Starring: Rachael Leigh Cook, Annabella Sciorra, Cary Elwes, Kip Pardue, Cyia Batten, Wade Williams, Michael O'Neill.
Director: Dan Mintz
Studio: Silent Road Productions
Rated: R
Running Time: 94 minutes
Release: 2004
Reviewer: John Rice |
