This Review Reveals Minor Details About the Plot.
I Smell a Rat
Plot Overview
Florida schoolgirl Brittney Havers
(Susan Ward) honors her late mother's (Kathy Neff) final resting place off
Gator Alley. A year ago her mom had taken “a long drive off
a short pier” after discovering her husband's penchant for skirts
(“He's seen more pussy than an animal shelter.”) Brittney's
stepfather Niles Dunlap (Anthony Denison) boasts serious wealth
giving her pride of place as a senior at elite Blue Bay High, but
her slow-to-graduate nemesis Maya King (Leila Arcieri) regards her
as “trailer trash” for her mom's humble origins. The seniors
attend a rally where their Principal Mosster (Michael Chieffo) has
them addressed by Detective Michael Morrison (Linden Ashby) &
Coroner Julian Haynes (Joe Michael Burke) about the dangers of excess:
drugs, alcohol, and partying too hard. Of course there's a party.
Booze gets poured. Tops come off. Frat boys show up. And later that
night so does nasty Puerto Rican crime figure Cicatriz (Ski Carr)
to motivate Mr Dunlap to cough up his gambling debts.
Dunlap's private plane goes down the
following day. His will cuts out his stepdaughter but provides
handsomely for any blood relative. Maya comes forth claiming
to be his illegitimate daughter, provoking a cat fight with Brittney.
Insurance investigator Terence Bridge (Isaiah Washington)—a
black straining at his leash—starts asking uncomfortable questions.
There's a possibility of both inheritance and insurance fraud, in which
case we do have two handy, non-white out-of-towners for fall guys.
Ideology
Two conflicts emerge intimated
by (Prov. 30:33) “Surely the
churning of milk bringeth forth butter, and the wringing of the nose
bringeth forth blood: so the forcing of wrath bringeth forth
strife.” The idea in the
proverb is that a state of peace and conciliation can change
to one of conflict just as a liquid (milk) can change to solid (butter)
through constant agitation (churning.) Or hit a critical area (nose)
and it bleeds. The latter is illustrated in the movie when Mr Dunlap
is sporting a bloody nose after the Cuban roughs him up—the
editors even passed over some eye-candy to make room for his bloody
closeup. The lesson is applicable to Brittney who is sensitive about
her past (“You can take the girl out of the trailer park, but
you can't take the trailer park out of the girl.”) When her
partner in crime wants to cut into her profits, she retaliates (“I
want my share!”) right quick.
A constant aggravation
can lead to a sudden counterstrike just like milk turning into butter.
Such changes of form are played to the hilt here. We have a beach
volleyball game where the ball is batted back and forth over
the net until the tie-breaker when it's spiked and then the sandy
pitch gets mobbed. Cicatriz punches Dunlap in the gut, right –
left – right, followed by a slap, a gun in his face, and a threat
that he will take it out on his whole family if he doesn't get paid
when he returns. Bridge criticizes the coroner for smoking cancer
sticks that will eventually kill him, who then replies that everybody
dies sometime. Dr. Haynes explains
a DNA paternity test
in court: “Take the bone marrow and grind it into little pieces
and then you add in some dye elements and some chemicals and you put
that all into an agarose gel.” The sample strands must be chemically
multiplied to get enough to test. Wine ferments over time, sugar turning
into alcohol and mold adding flavor. Cellar rats gnaw on the corks
and then get to the wine. They end up in a fuselage where they eat
through insulation to expose control wires. Then it's curtains for
the plane. A parachute gets packed into a tight bundle, and when the
rip cord is pulled, fabric spills out floating on air. When an armed
redneck confronts a suspicious looking black man at night, a nervous
Bridge pulls out his investigator business cards and hands one over
after several drop to the ground. He's had “eleven years of
cutting checks to assholes in wheel chairs who later are dancing
a jig in Maui.” He's taken all the abuse (“the rich get
richer”) he will take. “Now it's payback time.”
Production Values
“” Video (2004) was directed by Jack Perez. It was written by Ross Helford and Andy Hurst. It stars Susan Ward and Leila Arcieri. The handsome cast was pleasant to watch playing their non-demanding roles.
MPAA rated it R for strong sexuality, language and violence. The photography is amateurish in a two-dimensional kind of way. The music isn't enough to rescue the lackluster screen. The cast are not given enough material to make sense of. The dolls are young and gorgeous if somewhat vacuous. The editors hadn't enough takes to choose from following a rushed 21 days of shooting.
Review Conclusion w/a Christian's Recommendation
The director characterizes this film as straddling the knife edge between camp and melodrama. It's self-aware having the audience on. It gallops from one trope to another ignoring necessary plot development. Then when it comes to iconic moments, it lingers a while. After squeezing in all the heavily-borrowed scenes one could ever wish for into a scant 1½ hours, continuity be damned, the credits roll. Running alongside them are all the scenes needed for the movie to make sense. Thank you, director. But wait! There is one final, royal plot twist. And if that isn't enough, we are left with the open-ended feeling that there are more sequels to come. One of the survivors says to another over drinks, “They do make them strong here, don't they?” I'll drink to that.
Movie Ratings
Action factor: Decent action scenes. Suitability For Children: Not Suitable for Children of Any Age. Special effects: Wake up and smell the 1990s technology. Video Occasion: Good for Groups You Want to Mess With. Suspense: Keep a tight grip on the edge of your seat. Overall movie rating: Three stars out of five.
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