Copycat (1995, Jon Amiel)

It’s easy to pick out the “best” thing in Copycat because it’s almost entirely atrocious. Christopher Young’s highly derivative score is lovely—it’s a mix between John Williams and then Aliens whenever Sigourney Weaver is in thriller danger. Thanks to the score, Copycat makes some interesting swings, like emotive, romantic music during the most inappropriate sequences. Again, outside aping Ripley moments, it never fits the content, but it is definitely lovely.

Otherwise, the high point is J.E. Freeman’s performance as the grizzled police captain. He’s fine. They cut away from him too soon because he’s clearly knawing on the set. I really wanted to see him munch on his coffee mug, which always seems inevitable.

Besides those two elements, it’s just a matter of what’s not godawful and what’s just bad.

What’s impressive about Freeman is he’s the only acceptable performance. Everyone else is either incompetent or appalling. A lot of it is Amiel’s direction. He’s inept at composing the Panavision shots—it’s a special kind of bad to waste San Francisco like Amiel wastes it (the lighting is fine, thanks to László Kovács’s photography but wow, what a waste of Kovács)—but he’s even worse at directing actors. Whether Weaver, who’s got a risibly written part, soulful surfer tech bro cop Dermot Mulroney, or incel serial killer William McNamara, Amiel does an incapable job with all of them. Oh, I forgot Will Patton. Poor Will Patton.

Copycat is supposed to be about Weaver teaming up with San Francisco homicide inspector Holly Hunter, but second-billed Hunter deserves an “and” credit. She takes a back seat to Mulroney, McNamara, and even Patton as her erstwhile love interest. Patton’s a sexist, racist fellow detective—Hunter and Mulroney are partners—and until it turns out he’s dangerously unfit, he just ruins scenes. Not because he’s the worst actor in them; instead, he’s a purposeless boil on the film. He’s there, so they don’t have to do a whole trope, just a three-quarters trope.

Of the main cast, Hunter’s the least bad. She’s never good because it’s a terrible movie, but you’re never slack-jawed at the badness of her performance. Like Weaver. So much bad acting from Weaver.

The script, courtesy Ann Biderman and David Madsen, is worse than Amiel’s direction. Likewise, Jim Clark and Alan Heim’s editing is lousy.

Copycat’s so abominable I don’t even want to talk about Harry Connick Jr.’s cameo as a hillbilly serial killer, which starts worse than it finishes, but only because his bad performance is less bad than the many other bad performances. It’s a derivative, insipid motion picture, so obviously rotten the cast don’t even earn sympathy for their embarrassing participation.

Pretty music, though. Very pretty music.

Fallen Angels (1993) s01e03 – The Quiet Room

The Quiet Room really, really, really, relies on its twist. The ending is really predictable too; like, director Soderbergh and writer Howard A. Rodman do way too well on the foreshadowing. Because Room is a slightly exaggerated noir–part of the “Fallen Angels” TV anthology–nothing really needs to be foreshadowed. There’s a twist Soderbergh and Rodman set up in the first third, the end just delivers on it in an extreme way. Two twists for the price (or time) of one.

By the last third, when it’s just the countdown to the reveal, both lead performances softly crater. Soderbergh makes sure the lovely Emmanuel Lubezki and luscious Armin Ganz production design slow the descent. But the descent is inevitable because it’s just a noir TV anthology episode. With a source short story. And a somewhat salacious twist, at least as far as noir goes; if Quiet Room were going for homage, it might work better. Instead, it tries to be something different.

Joe Mantegna and Bonnie Bedelia are dirty cops. They’re having a love affair, which no one knows about; besides them, the only significant character is Mantegna’s teenage daughter, Vinessa Shaw (in the most important performance and the consistently worst). Mantegna is a single dad, out all hours because he and Bedelia have a shakedown racket going. Bedelia collars prostitutes and then beats information out of them about their johns so Mantegna can go and shake down the johns. Peter Gallagher has what seems like a great cameo as one of them, but then J.E. Freeman is one of the other ones and he’s freaking amazing in a much smaller role. Freeman walks away with the whole thing. Especially given how it finishes up.

Mantegna is mostly all right. He really whiffs when he needs to make it work. Bedelia’s better. Neither of them get good roles though. It’s all about Freeman though, performance-wise.

Soderbergh’s direction is fine. He’s got a handful of nice shots and does well with the actors. Sometimes well with the actors. There’s only so much to do with the script, especially as it starts barreling towards the inevitable conclusion. Soderbergh doesn’t do anything to slow its descent, much less stop it.