Pursuit

Numerous people in the history of the film industry are overrated. Several ones are underrated, and then there's a small group of people that are massively, scandalously, and incomprehensibly underrated! In this last group sits writer/director Michael Crichton, although - admittedly - he would remain underrated even if he received a dozen of Oscars and a life-size statue on Hollywood Boulevard. That's how genius he was.

With "Pursuit" Crichton dropped off his calling card as a director. Two of his novels were previously adapted already, namely the stupendous "The Andromeda Strain" and the quirky "The Carey Treatment", but here Crichton decided to turn his own novel (written under a pseudonym name) into a film scenario and direct it himself. Being a modestly produced, short, and mainly dialogue-driven TV-movie, "Pursuit" was also the ideal rehearsal for Crichton's bigger and more legendary works "Westworld", "Coma", and "The First Great Train Robbery".

What anyone should admire about Michael Crichton is how his stories seem grotesque and unlikely to happen at first, but they are nevertheless brought in such a disturbingly realistic fashion that gradually the viewer gets persuaded that the top-event is inevitable from happening. The top-event can refer to robot-gunslingers in theme park turning against the human visitors, genetically engineered dinosaurs breaking out, or - in this case - one politically engaged psychopath being able to steal nerve gas from the government and conspire a large-scaled attack against the President and an entire city of innocent bystanders.

From the very first second and throughout the entire 75 minutes of running time, "Pursuit" is a tense edge-of-your-seat thriller with a stressful atmosphere and great performances of both Ben Gazzara and E. G. Marshal. Via the simple yet effective trick of occasionally showing a countdown-clock at the bottom of the screen, Crichton makes clear how urgent it's getting for CIA bulldog Steve Graves to apprehend the mysterious James Wright and figure out his terrorist scheme. A few little defaults here and there (like an ungracious exit for the lead villain) but mostly good stuff.

One of my local UHF channels showed this movie on a Saturday afternoon. Overall, it is very well done, especially for a made-for-TV movie. The movie moved along at a good pace and the acting was good all around. It is a little reminiscent of the early episodes of "Columbo". Ben Gazzara is pursuing E.G. Marshall, who he knows is planning to do something at a Democratic national convention in San Diego. The two repeatedly try to outwit each other, all the while knowing that the other guy is watching every move. This makes for some interesting plot twists and blind alleys. Crichton, as usual, pays very close attention to technological details, making the premise very realistic, unlike a lot of "caper" movies where plot hinges on an essential piece of knowledge the character could not possibly have had. I'm really surprised this hasn't been remade for the big screen, given Michael Crichton's popularity.

The iconic writer Michael Crichton had another book taken to screen about political fictional thriller, the premise is far-fetched by countless reasons, firstly for a politic extremist forego the democratic system to appeal to killing of thousand on political convention by hazardous gas stolen from US's Army, it sounds a bit weird to solve this neuralgic issue, second the cat and mouse game conceived by egocentric politician played by E. G. Marshall against the US' agent of intelligence Ben Gazzara to the extent of a character study upon psych profile.

The screenplay has plenty of noticeable holes, meanwhile E. G. Marshall sets free to built a bomb device thru an inertness of FBI's agents, looks like deliberate by pure foolishness to get a proper tension to hold the audience, to make it worst some oddities were appended in the lame plot, some catches wisely designed by the perpetrator in a bomb shut down process, it will raises the strain thru the countdown at last seconds, in the meantime the missing President is reaching in the crowed convention.

On the casting appears the upcoming star Martin Sheen at small role, someone wrote in his review that E. G. Marshall was miscasting to play a villain, whereby I agree, he doesn't fit well in this kind evil persona, the veteran actor often portraited a nice guy on serious character.

Thanks for reading.

Resume:

First watch: 1992 / How many: 2 / Source: TV-Youtube / Rating: 6.25.

I read Binary, Pursuit's first title, published under the pseudonym John Lange. Crichton published under a pseudonym because he was afraid his med school instructors would doubt his dedication to medicine (at that time he still wanted to be a doctor). The title Pursuit was ordered by the studio, fearing that the public would not understand the title Binary, and the general incomprehension about biowarfare agents in 1972 help land Crichton the Director's job. First run as an ABC TV movie of the week. Pursuit is fast paced with a surprisingly high powered cast: EG Marshall, Wm Windom, Ben Gazarra, and a young Martin Sheen as what may very well be the first role as the small screen's first computer hacker. It's a good TV thriller at least thirty years ahead of its time

I am surprised that no one has noticed that this film may have inspired 24 series, that's my own opinion at least. I appreciated this TV movie, very well paced but unfortunately too much foreesable, predictable. Good job anyway, no problem.