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New Mystery Films Reviewed

By Marsha McCreadie

Miss McCreadie

Even Aristotle would agree that in the exorcism of pity and fear he recommended for the drama, it was The Blair Witch Project that struck the most terror (and made the most money) this last summer. Of course the true terror sprang in the hearts of Hollywood producers: if a coupla amateurs could market their movie over the internet, what would happen to the jobs of honcho producers?

And still another shock was in store for the movie establishment in charge of the thriller genre. Though few industry pundits-and even fewer critics--predicted it, the movie Double Jeopardy blew all competitors out of the water three week-ends in a row. Most would have bet on The Limey in this regard: a movie with glam guys (Terence Stamp and Peter Fonda) and a thriller revenge plot, not that more homely thing: a weepie it was called in the '40s, a woman's film. Today it's known as a "jep" film-a sure fire-formula for movies on channels like "Lifetime"-and shows a woman in fear for her life and many other things. With roots back to the Gothic novel of terror as done by the Bronte gals (Rebecca, novel and film, being a pop culture spin-off), the contemporary version has Ashley Judd turning the tables. This time, though, the joke's on the guy.

Perhaps it takes an outsider to see what has been missing from our culture, and make book on it. Beresford, an Australian director who made his name with Breaker Morant,

works a genre to capitalize on today's female anger. So, despite its structural incongruities-a k a, a plot with holes--Beresford's new film has hit a nerve. (55% of the film's viewers are women, though judging by the reactions of the afternoon audience I saw the film with, there's a lot of folks out there who feel disenfranchised about the workings of the law.) Beresford must like this genre: he directed a violent femmes sort of film with Sharon Stone on death row in Last Dance.

And also Paradise Road, a more genteel version of the form, with gallant Anglo women behind bars in a Japanese prison camp during World War II.

Of course there haven been any chicks behind bars films in a long time. Thus the popularity of the film's trailer: the-now jailed female lawyer in a hairnet dishing out slop in the prison kitchen, telling Ashley Judd how to get even with her husband by using the legal concept `double jeopardy`. Some commenters on the film have said this is not legitimate legal doctrine; in fact it is: Res Judicata. But that wouldn't make for a very catchy film title.

Judd is cute, clever, and controlled as a princess gone under, at least for a while. The victim of a set-up in which her slick entrepreneur husband (Bruce Greenwood) has staged his "murder" and framed her, Judd loses not just her freedom after her murder conviction, but her house by the beautiful bay in Seattle, her son, and a trusted, much loved nanny (Annabeth Gish). While in jail, Judd learns to manipulate the prison system, the courts, and ultimately springs herself, to go-not on the rampage that one might have expected from the template of Thelma and Louise-on a most effective search and destroy mission. How far we have come!

Along the way she spends time in a halfway house run by a disbarred law professor now parole officer, Tommy Lee Jones. This movie seems to have something against attorneys, or anyway shows how erasable is the line between lawyers and wrong-doing. In a type he has down to a Tee by now, Jones is tough but vulnerable, and the duo do some nice turns on an old motif: the prisoner and the warden, and the special bond that can spring up between them. Of course it helps that they are of the opposite sex.

Also au courant-credit here to the film's writers, David Weisberg and Douglas Cook--Double Jeopardy pulls in the motif of missing or lost children, both for Judd and Jones. The movie also has one of the wittiest and best-delivered one-liners this season as Judd turns down a pesky pursuer: "I'd love to, but I've got to check with my parole officer first." Not to be put off, Suitor makes further inquiries. Judd shakes her head in disgust at the tabloid prose. "Oh, I murdered my husband. The papers called me a slicer/dicer." It's got more punch than "I've got to wash my hair."

There's another angry woman out there too, getting her own back. This time it's Mom, a k a, Mother Nature in The Blair Witch Project. One of the least frightening films ever made-if nothing else the faux cinema verite with shaky hand held camera is snicker-inducing-its power comes from other primal fears. For if you think the natural world isn't getting her own back of late you haven't been watching the Weather Channel much. Watching Josh, Heather, and Josh--three dopey and pretentious student filmmakers chasing down witch lore and getting done in by the Maryland woods--is the crux of The Blair Witch Project. Rain, losing your compass, and your way out of the woods can still get you. And when the forest turns on you, there's little that can be done.

Another even more sinister appeal is that third world audiences, with whom I saw the film, howl in delight watching the three college jerks who lose it along with their map. In fact, their loss of composure was real; the three who "played themselves" were not told by the movie's writers/directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez what their Hellish shooting schedule would be or entail. (The film was made for $35,000 by the five student filmmakers from the University of Central Florida.) Another nasty bit is the fact that of the three, it is the young woman who is the most reduced to snot, slobbering, and big baby-dom. If there is another revenge motif to The Blair Witch Project, it's that this particular career female at the helm-the film's director in the film-within-a-film-is taken down in a most humiliating fashion.

In a way, both these cinematic success stories prove the old Italian adage: revenge is a dish best eaten cold. With both the Mob and Sicily in mind, you've got to admit that the Italians may know a thing or two about getting even.

By Marsha McCreadie

(McCreadie has writen four books on film, the most recent THE WOMEN WHO WRITE THE MOVIES (Birch Lane Press). She was daily film reviewer at the Arizona Republic. Also, she has written for the NY Times, the Voice, Daily News, Premiere, Film Comment and others.)