Director: Jonathan Demme
Year Released: 1986
Rating: 2.0
Melanie Griffith (whose appearance changes from Louise Brooks as Lulu to Kim Novak in Vertigo) impulsively hits on Jeff Daniels after lunch one day, stealing him away from his bland, excessively conservative life. She wants to do 'something wild,' he wants to whine and complain about how 'wrong' it is, stammering and awkward like a beefy Woody Allen. Eventually, the light romantic fare is transformed into a violent nightmare because of lunatic Ray Liotta (who needs good parts like this). Brilliant at changing tones - in fact, the cinematography and direction are both top notch - but the character development is weak and the screenplay contains mostly juvenile, sub-par dialogue. Also, there's the issue with the soundtrack: while I like the variety of music selected by Demme et al., they don't all work together - the Go-Betweens are smashed in between reggae and David Byrne - and there are just too damn many songs (Ted Demme had the same problem), making me think I'm watching a music video instead of a 'movie' where people are supposed to converse freely.
