Peter Bogdanovich made one of the all time great come backs with Mask - a hit film, great reviews, and without Polly Platt too. But then he stumbled again - fought with Universal, struggled financially, then made this for Dino de Laurentiis.
It's a spectacular misfire, a horrible film, absolutely unfunny. How much was Bogdanovich's fault? Rob Lowe says he rewrote the script and Bogdanovich was never a good screenwriter. Bogdanovich says the film was cut without his involvement. Isn't that what they all say?
It has the hall marks of many of his flops - endless long takes of people yabbering without it being funny. The actors try, try so hard. Rob Lowe imitates Ryan O'Neal and does fine - he doesn't disgrace himself, he can talk fast, and in a better movie would have made a real impression. Colleen Camp I normally like but she's ten years older than Lowe, which matters in a movie where they were at high school together.
There's a hollow core at the centre because Lowe leaves one relationship, winds up on jury duty, Camp's on trial... then Lowe is obsessed with Camp. Why have the first girlfriend? And Camp doesn't remember Lowe so they have no connection it makes Lowe feel like a stalker.
They set up a possible alternate love interest with Kim Myer as this other girl involved but she has unfunny buddy comedy antics with Louise Stratten (Dorothy's sister and later Bogdanovich's wife, a part the director wrote in for her... she doesn't make much of an impression and spends a lot of time sleeping on the shoulder of her friend; they share similar haircuts).
There's all these characters: comic hit men, prosecutors, a judge, Lowe's bespectacled brother. Lowe's mother, some cop, Harry Carey Jn. But it's awful - they run around yapping lines in late 80s fashion.
The basic idea was actually solid - a juror tries to help a woman on trial. That was the plot of Murder! the Hithcock film and also Suspect with Cher. But this totally stuffs it.
There's lots of voice over which feels like something rushed in post production.
