I'll just quote pieces of peter-sweeney's review as it pretty much matches my impressions..
"This started out well and quite gripping and to this viewer was looking forward to further developments. The height of this was finding out he had not killed Russell's son i.e. lucky to discover a photo of him; and then by further incredible chance finding out what the police was going to do his father (who was in a terror campaign against the hero's family). Everything going fine to this point and yes sure, very Cape Fear. Then it all shifted into a downward spiral as soon as Don Johnson arrived in a vague comic characterisation tone and all plausibility for a real decent thriller disappeared."
Couldn't agree more. The first half of the movie was really well done, with some great takes and a very well-done music score. But, Don Johnson's character semi-comic entry totally didn't match the ominous appearance of Sam Shepard's character from the first half. The movie went downhill from there on and Shepard's character became an empty shell with no other motivation, but to kill his son which he doesn't know, but was ready to avenge only a few days before.
"Few issues with this i) the police in the hero's small home town were corrupt i.e. trying to kill Russell's father. This story loop was left untied. ii) The hero's wife let him go to Houston on a pretty flimsy excuse with no real effort to find out his real reasons especially when he had been acting a bit suspiciously iii) The father and son relationship was well non-existent, neither knowing each other."
Yeah, many issues are unresolved in the end. But, e.g. 1) perhaps the police was not bating the father, but once he came, he threatened to blow the whole cover murder of his son, so the police decided to silence him. But, since it was an FBI case, it feels weird that the local cops would resort to murder the guy who didn't actually do anything serious yet and especially that they would do it to the FBI's benefit only.
"Good points are i) the early tension and favourite being ii)the John Carpenter style electronic music permeating through the movie. Real bad point - the last hour!"
Loved the music score, was thoroughly disappointed with the other half of the movie which seemed like a rather different movie altogether.
"This started out well and quite gripping and to this viewer was looking forward to further developments. The height of this was finding out he had not killed Russell's son i.e. lucky to discover a photo of him; and then by further incredible chance finding out what the police was going to do his father (who was in a terror campaign against the hero's family). Everything going fine to this point and yes sure, very Cape Fear. Then it all shifted into a downward spiral as soon as Don Johnson arrived in a vague comic characterisation tone and all plausibility for a real decent thriller disappeared."
Couldn't agree more. The first half of the movie was really well done, with some great takes and a very well-done music score. But, Don Johnson's character semi-comic entry totally didn't match the ominous appearance of Sam Shepard's character from the first half. The movie went downhill from there on and Shepard's character became an empty shell with no other motivation, but to kill his son which he doesn't know, but was ready to avenge only a few days before.
"Few issues with this i) the police in the hero's small home town were corrupt i.e. trying to kill Russell's father. This story loop was left untied. ii) The hero's wife let him go to Houston on a pretty flimsy excuse with no real effort to find out his real reasons especially when he had been acting a bit suspiciously iii) The father and son relationship was well non-existent, neither knowing each other."
Yeah, many issues are unresolved in the end. But, e.g. 1) perhaps the police was not bating the father, but once he came, he threatened to blow the whole cover murder of his son, so the police decided to silence him. But, since it was an FBI case, it feels weird that the local cops would resort to murder the guy who didn't actually do anything serious yet and especially that they would do it to the FBI's benefit only.
"Good points are i) the early tension and favourite being ii)the John Carpenter style electronic music permeating through the movie. Real bad point - the last hour!"
Loved the music score, was thoroughly disappointed with the other half of the movie which seemed like a rather different movie altogether.