Rating of
1.5/4
Somewhat thrilling at first, but problems turn up
Ichabod Crane - wrote on 10/26/10
This film was semi effective for me the first time but it certainly loses all of its semi cheap thrills the second time around. They sometimes just come off as unintentionally funny like when De Niro dresses up as the maid. Many times many of the scenes simply do not hold up under any scrutiny, such as De Niro tape recording Nolte's threat. Did he always have his conversations recorded, did he know he was going to be attacked that time, it is a bit much. Also when he is attacked why honestly would he not just look past the dumpster. Than too many scenes go too far with Cady's invincibility, they simply do not villains from the nineties onward in any realistic way. De Niro keeps coming and talking even though he should have been dead a long time ago.
The angle of the daughter is too much to take even from a rebellious daughter, it just does not work. It seems ultimately forced and Juliette Lewis simply was too old for the part. The thriller is also flawed due to the everyone being evil part, It just does not work well for a thriller.
De Niro is properly creepy at first despite his terrible accent, but at the end his performance becomes laughably bad. Especially the very end where he sounds like when Judge Doom in roger rabbit being run over a steam roller.
Scorsese's direction really is disappointing in this film. Many times when he had a greater flair in his direction it really seems forced and oddly amateurish at times. It simply is not a highpoint of his directorial career. The overall film does not work, but there is one thing I did like a lot was Robert Mitchum was great in his cameo, but perhaps that was just a remainder of the superior original.
