Vitrine Sur Meurtre

It must be getting hard to come up with fresh ideas for some nut case to be chasing around after someone. It's a pretty basic formula after all. There isn't a whole lot of room for originality. In the case of Flinch, you have two people who know the identity of the killer and he in turn knows they know he killed someone.

Did I mention the two people trying to evade the demented killer are live floor window models for a department store played by none other than Judd Nelson and Gina Gershon? Thankfully they work really well together on screen. That leaves Nick Mancuso to be the obsessed artist/killer who owns an art studio called Torso's. His turn as the baddie is the kind you seen him do many times before.

The story rolls out in a predictable made-for-TV fashion. There's no surprises, no real flair and an abundance of stock characters that would feel right at home in a sit-com. It does what it has to do to be watchable but not a smidgen more. It's not a movie you talk about, set aside time or money for. You catch it late night and maybe you watch it out of boredom. You know the routine.

Reasonably entertaining time-waster. Nelson and Gershon play live store-window dummies who witness a murder. The murderer doesn't realize at first that he'd been spotted. It's a plot that had been used before in City That Never Sleeps (1953), although this is not a remake. There are some plot problems, I think, as when towards the end when the killer gets into a locked, alarmed building without problems. The movie lacks anything particularly exceptional; the cinematography, editing, dialogue, etc. all work but don't stand out in any way.

Very intense psychological thriller, absolutely loved it.

Never doubt this movie 📼

The dialogue is painful, the plot is sort of melodramatic and Judd Nelson's monotone loses its charm after the tenth second. But Nick Mancuso and Gina Gershon have wonderful exchanges at the end, and their acting separately is nothing short of magical despite the junk all around them. He is quite the subtle antagonist, and she builds layers of the character without seeming obvious. It's worth watching just for Gina and Nick, if you're the sort to watch a movie for the style of acting.

They wanted to make a movie about witnesses to a murder, some chases, a stupid cop, some sex, with the Hollywood ending. A plausible story with a flowing plot? Forget that. The characters had no reason for any of their behavior, the evil guy is far from diabolical, and the ending was just plain stupid.

The acting was horrible, but then, they didn't have much to work with. Judd Nelson's character was especially unbelievable. He's failed the bar exam so he can't be a lawyer, but come on, a law school graduate can't get a better job than a living mannequin?

The curse of insomnia is that there's absolutely nothing good on TV.