This Review Reveals Minor Details About the Plot.
Worms in the Big Apple
Plot Overview
Yellow journalist Rowena Price (Halle Berry) has uncovered the dirt on "Family First" Senator Stephen Sachs (Gordon MacDonald) only to have her "SACHS-UAL HARASSMENT" story (“Your source dried up”) spiked by (“Your story's dead”) Narron (Richard Portnow) the editor. Not every story makes it into print, its worthiness notwithstanding, but Ro overreacts and quits. “Methinks the lady doth protest too much,” said William Shakespeare. She goes by a secret male byline: David Shane. His admiring readers regard “him” as hard-bitten where a woman would be bitchy. In masculine terms she could be described per author Sam Savage:
I had always imagined that a real
writer would spend a lot of time lounging about in cafes having
witty conversations with scintillating people and that
sometimes he would bring home a beautiful girl with long dark
hair and then throw her out the next morning so that he could get
back to work — ‘Sorry doll, I've got a book to
write.’ I imagined him locked in his room for days at a time,
drinking quarts of whiskey from a Woolworth tumbler and pounding at
his Underwood into the wee hours. He was never clean-shaven
and never had a beard, always just a two-day stubble. A certain
bitterness lurked in the corners of his mouth, and his sad eyes
betrayed an ironic je
ne sais quoi. (119)
Ro
singlemindedly pursues stories, sometimes
tolerating assistance from her hacker helper Miles Haley
(Giovanni Ribisi) who holds an unreciprocated crush on
her. She has no boyfriends, no girlfriends, no pets but
has been known to entertain an old boyfriend Cameron
(Gary Dourdan) at night until she throws him out on his ear
(“Get out of my house.”) She drinks until she's tipsy.
She has a fantastic wardrobe (“Wow!”) but just throws
something on as a man would in a hurry. Her latest project is
personal, to investigate the untimely death of her lifelong
friend Grace Clayton (Nicki Aycox) who'd been threatening to expose
her married lover, advertising executive Harrison Hill (Bruce
Willis.) Ro goes undercover as a temp in his agency.
Snippets of flashbacks throw
light on Rowena. She & Grace were next door neighbors as
children. Grace is White and Ro's father was White, so we take it
they grew up in a whitish neighborhood. Ro and her mother back
then look alike and have light, Latina brown skin. Child Rowena,
however, is outright black and has negroid lips. They all have
straight hair, but the old mother, now in a home, sports an afro
turned white and has blue eyes while Ro's are brown. None of this
is explained; indeed these scenes are so brief they may escape
notice. Yet there's a subliminal suggestion there are family
secrets untold. One remembered conversation started by
Ro's dad is finished by Harrison in Ro's mind, so it's evident she
has unresolved daddy issues.
Ideology
(Prov. 30:5-6) “Every word of
God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.
Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be
found a liar.” Ro observes, “Money is the root of all
evil, Miles.” He replies, “Check your scripture.
‘Love of money is the root of all evil’, Ro.
Love.” This movie is rife with all kinds of greed. Grace is
a bad girl trying to shake down Harrison. When she hits a dead end,
she passes on the tip to Rowena. Ro has tried to distance
herself from Grace, but they exchange favors from time to
time. Harrison is suspected in Grace's murder for to silence her.
But then if Harrison's wife Mia Reinhart-Hill (Paula Miranda) has
found out, she might have done her in herself. Mia's an artist
whose studio would have stocked the poison used, but it's used for
other things as well, like eye surgery and witchcraft, and
it's readily available. Grace had many enemies, and somebody
made her suffer, so it's probably personal. All Harrison's money is
in Mia's name whose dad owns the company. Harrison lost two sexual
harassment lawsuits, and Mia now keeps him on a tight leash, but he
still fools around. There's a lesbian in the office keeping tabs on
him, and there are the regular gossips, too, and business espionage
is alive and well. Ro is right in her element with birds of a feather.
Production Values
“” (2007) was directed by James Foley. Its screenplay was by Todd Komarnicki based on a story by Jon Bokenkamp. It stars Halle Berry, Bruce Willis and Giovanni Ribisi. Berry is tough. Everyone knew how to act. Willis and Berry had no real chemistry together, but that's fine because Berry's character found the man—every man?—distasteful, and her appeal to him was that of new girl/forbidden fruit; it wasn't expected to go anywhere.
MPA rated
it R for sexual content, nudity,
some disturbing violent images and language. Digital
communications approximated speech rhythms by using fast
typing, senders who talked to themselves, and machines
programmed to talk back. Not as good as in-person
conversations, but they did their best and deserve a break.
The overall pacing was pretty good, and it never got bogged
down. If there's any fault, it's in too many baddies to keep track of
them all. But it's that kind of movie. Runtime is 1 hour 49 minutes.
Review Conclusion w/a Christian's Recommendation
There's one easily recognized Bible verse misquoted and then corrected by the nerd. It's very applicable to this plot, and to a lot of plots. Everybody but the cops was crooked while the latter were just stupid. This is what I'd call a Hitchcockian movie. Enough said.
Movie Ratings
Action factor: Decent action scenes. Suitability For Children: Not Suitable for Children of Any Age. Special effects: Average special effects. Video Occasion: Fit For a Friday Evening. Suspense: Keeps you on the edge of your seat. Overall movie rating: Four stars out of five.
Works Cited
Scripture quoted from the King James Version. Pub. 1611, rev. 1769. Software.
Savage, Sam. Firmin. © Sam Savage 2006. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2008. Print.
bibles.n7nz.org