------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Overall Rating : 5.5/10
Directed By : James Foley
Halle Berry (Monster's Ball)
Bruce Willis (Live Free or Die Hard)
Giovanni Ribisi (Flight of the Phoenix)
Nicki Aycox (Jeepers Creepers 2)
Supplied By : Sony Pictures
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : August. 7, 2007
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| PLOT When her friend’s affair with married ad exec Harrison Hill ends in the woman’s murder, investigative reporter Rowena Price vows to bring the killer to justice. Suspecting Hill of the crime, she goes undercover by posing as two highly alluring women: Katherine, a sexy temp who works within his agency, and Veronica, a seductive temptress he chats up online. Engaging in a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse, both Rowena and Hill begin to realize things may not be what they seem. For some people will go to great lengths to protect their secrets, even if it means risking everything. |
||||
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ||||
| THE REVIEW Rowena is a Journalist whom as wrote a number of high-profile articles(all under a Pseudonym pen name), and when her article fails to come to fruition, she finds herself looking for her next break. Well, when her long time friend Grace mysteriously turns up dead, Rowena has suspicions as to who committed the crime, and all suspicion points to a powerful ad executive by the name of Harrison Hill. In hopes to bringing the murder case to light in her next case, she goes undercover and begins to work for Harrison's agency under the name Katherine Pouge, hoping to implement the business man for Grace's murder. As time goes on, with the help of her computer savvy friend Myles, through posing as an alias in online chat, and several late night dates, Rowena gets closer and closer to the truth, but the closer she gets the more she gets tangled in a web of mystery, just who can she trust? I've repeated this numerous times, in the last few reviews that i've done, but as of late I have seen a lot of high profile films, that although highly promoted and hyped, they left me unimpressed. So next up is PERFECT STRANGER, a film that stars Bruce Willis and Oscar award winner Halle Berry. Over the years, i've learned, that just because you have big names in the cast, it doesn't necessarily guarantee a quality film or even performances - but in turn the names do tend to draw box office numbers. So honestly, when I got it in the mail, I was glad it was going to be on the site for the sake of overall variety, but I really wasn't all too enthused to see it, as so many big name movies have let me down, but to my surprise I found this film to be rather lightly entertaining. PERFECT STRANGER is a suspense/ thriller by it's own self-inflicted definition, but it is light on both. It plays out like a straight-forward mystery, that is basically in the "paint-by-numbers" formula, it has the cliché twists, betrayal and all of the other staples you are likely to see in other films of this nature. The film is a lot less complex than a lot of the films of this type, it is easy for the audience to follow, and doesn't require a lot of thinking to understand what is going on. It does had a few twists herE and there that are even similar to films like THE NUMBER 23, with the film's "shocking" ending being the most similar, but unlike THE NUMBER 23, PERFECT STRANGER ties all of it's lose ends together, in a way that the story makes sense, and has a back-story that is more plausible and interesting. No matter how interesting a story may be, all of it is kept together with the performances of the cast. The acting here is not always perfect, in fact I felt that at some points in the film Halle Berry was a little too over-dramatic with her character. I really liked Bruce Willis's portrayal as Harrison Hill, I felt he handled the role of "promiscuous player" quite well. But the performance that kept the film interesting and easy going was from actor Giovanni Ribisi as Myles, Rowena's seemingly right hand man, whom turns out to have a bigger role in the film than you would initially think. Honorable mention goes to Nicki Aycox(from JEEPERS CREEPERS 2), who plays the ill-fated Grace, her screen time is very limited, but both her beauty and acting presence leaves the viewer wishing to see more of her...it's a shame. Overall, I enjoyed PERFECT STRANGER for the most part. It's a thriller that's easy to watch and actually makes sense in the end, unlike many films that leave you scratching your head in an attempt to figure out what it is you just watched. But it does have a few cons, such as instances of over-acting and various product plugs for the likes of Reebok and Victoria's Secret, that at times has the film feeling like one big infomercial... |
||||
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ||||
| GORE
METER 1/10 A stabbing, a face slashing and and a decaying corpse all all that is seen |
||||
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ||||
| MUSICAL
SCORE 1.5/10 The score is very distant from the audience making only a very dull presence for itself, to be honest, I barely noticed it. |
||||
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ||||
| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM Although I vaguely referenced it in my review, the film capitalizes on the growing trend of the internet and online chatting, and the possibility for deception, many films have used it, so much so that the concept is getting old. But I found myself watching the film for it's conclusion, and I thought a good job(still not great) was done in the build-up of the story.....it was enough to keep me watching. This DVD will be released on August 21, 2007 |
||||
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ||||
| STILLS | ||||
|
