L'échange

Peter and Alice Bowman are working on a dam in South America in the employment of a large oil company. When Peter is kidnapped the company bring in expert negotiator Terry Thorne. However when the oil company runs out of money due to no insurance, they take Terry off the case and he leaves for another job. However a pang of conscience brings him back to help Alice and he replaces the corrupt locals. As he tries to help get her husband back he also falls for Alice.

As a fan of David Caruso, I was annoyed that I missed this film at the cinema (I blinked and I missed it!) and by the time the video came out it had slipped my mind. Shown of tv last night was the perfect time for me to see it and, despite negative reviews, I actually quite enjoyed it. I think the problem is that the critics struggled to get past the handful of problems (more later) to find that the film was an effective, if talky, drama with a thriller edge. The premise is good and it allows tense scenes where Terry tough talks as well as scenes with Peter with his captors. It's not perfect in this regard as it is a bit talky but for me it was engaging - I got the impression from other comments that people had expected raging gun battles all the way through the film.

However what does damage the film is Alice Bowman. I can see the potential behind Terry and Alice's romance - it could have been another layer of drama. In reality it doesn't work a bit and only serves to take away from the main thrust of the film - their relationship never convinces and nothing of interest is actually done with it. Likewise the character of Alice doesn't really work either - I never believed she was emotionally going through the wringers to the degree the script suggested she would be. A big part of the blame for this must lie with Meg Ryan herself. She is miscast in the first place, but on top of that she is too pristine throughout the film - hair and makeup perfect no matter what and a stupid little hippie-girl personality that stops her being a real person. It is a bad performance and the film would have benefited from a shorter running time which lost the romance subplot and scaled back on Ryan's time.

However she is carried by a real star turn from Crowe. It may not be that clever a role but he does `tough' really well and he helps improve the tension of several scenes. Morse is a good actor and he does well here. The only downside of his performance is that he seemed fit and well outside of his makeup; I was looking for him to look thinner and mentally battered as the film progressed but he didn't - it's not his fault, I guess the film had no time to do this. Caruso gives the same tough performance he does in every thing he ever does so if you like that then you'll like him here - I do!

Overall this is an enjoyable film if you can get past it's major problems surrounding Alice and Terry's relationship. Script-wise this aspect was weak on paper, but a comparatively rubbish turn from the miscast Meg Ryan just makes it all the weaker. Thank god that the basic premise is tense and the male leads' tough talking is good fun.

Maureen O'Hara stars in a movie where her husband gets kidnapped those damn commies in South East Asia so she hires tough and dashing soldier of fortune Clark Gable to save the day

That's not the cast or the location of PROOF OF LIFE but it does have a very similar plot . Did someone mention this was a 1940s matinée blockbuster ? Just curious because while I was watching the movie I was struck by how old fashioned everything felt . Russell Crowe plays an Aussie who served in the SAS and saves a Frenchman from the Chechens in the opening sequence , but you could have had Gable playing an American paratrooper saving someone from the Red Army on the River Elbe in May 1945 . Different actor , different period of history , different enemy but still the same basic story with the action switching from Europe to say South East Asia in 1950

That's not to say PROOF OF LIFE is a bad film . It's not and I found it mainly entertaining though perhaps a little too long . It's just that it is so old fashioned that you can see where the predictable story threads are going to begin and end . You can't deny that both the cast and action scenes are good , it's just that you also can't stop thinking it would have been better if it'd been filmed in monochrome and directed by Michael Curtiz with no bad language or sexual references

I was impressed by Proof of Life and would only make one comment. In most movies, the plot is tightened up to be fast-paced, convincing, make you identify with and care about the characters, and even contain a little moral or have something to say about the human condition.

When a film like Proof of Life is based on a true story, there are limits to this. The worst example I can think of being A Civil Action, which I'm sure is true to the story but the ending was not satisfying and deflated the entire film.

So it's definitely worth seeing, but it's a little slow, and like real life the there is no consistent "tone" to the plot twists. (The film does not fit neatly into one genre throughout.)

Who should see this film:

-- Action buffs who won't mind that only some stuff blows up and the film is a little arty

-- Drama fans who are curious about the topic, but who are not expecting a romance and won't mind a little violence

-- People who'd like some gritty realism concerning Latin American civil uprisings

I give "Proof of Life" a 7 out of 10.

Its an OK movie overall. There is no arguing that Russel Crowe has some charisma in this film. And Meg Ryan... is Meg Ryan and really not a good fit. Overall not anything to get that excited about. But the action sequences, both when Peter is captured and the film ending hostage rescue sequence in my opinion are some of the greatest and most accurate in film. Not perfect, this is a movie so some creative/dramatic license was taken, but way above par compared to most any other film I can think of with very rare exception. Its pretty clear that they had a rare combination of fantastic military consultants along with a director and cinematographer willing to listen and make the most of it. Tactics, equipment, effects (with obligatory gasoline added to explosions...), even hand signals, how the guerrilla's operate... Spot on! Quite the rarity and very refreshing.

Really can't say enough good things about the action sequences. Movie is worth seeing just for this. The rest... meh.

This looked like something made in the 80s, what with the Rambo/Uncommon Valor Finale, the psuedo-James Bondish globe trotting of Crowe in the lead and of course, Meg Ryan. I didn't mind this much, but there are a few things wrong with it...

One-it takes TOO long to get to the Rambo finale, which by the way is handled pretty well. You expect going in, to see Crowe taking at least half the flick to go in and get the poor guy being held hostage in the Andes. Not so. He spends instead an awful lotta time yakking into a two way radio with the baddies or pacing around some office or room or whatever. They needed to tighten THAT up.

Two-Meg Ryan while I like her, didn't seem to bring very much to this. I donno, she reminded me of her character from 'You've Got Mail'-it was almost as if she left Set#1 and went right onto Set#2 without skipping a beat. Not enough 'gravitas' to the casting or role.

Pamela Reed was kinda irritating but at least seemed like she gave a hang about her brother being held. They never Did bother to explain to us how she scraped up the lions share of that $600K by the way(which they never hadda use)either....

Crowe I like, in a Robert Mitchum kinda way this guy's the real deal. He was so good in the Rescue scenes that ya wish they'd turned this more into a 'Predator/Uncommon Valor' type flick and gone with that. I was reminded of 'Predator' in fact in the helicopter over the jungle shots....

For the most part, I consider this to be a mature, intelligent presentation-but there needs to be some more thinking to what exactly kinda film it is they want to make. The opening scenes in Chechenya are so effective, you wind up being disappointed and surprised in fact that it's Not That kinda flick; more negotiating and hostage scenes than anything else.

(I also, for what it's worth, will tip my hat to both the 'Missionary Guy' and David Morse, they were good. Morse usually is, in things like the Rock and whatever. And David Caruso seemed to be enjoying himself too-he was alright. Quite a comedown from NYPD Blue though, eh? He has disappeared pretty much...)

Overall-it's not bad, more a good VCR than anything else....

** outta ****