Boulevard

Small town girl Jennefer (Kari Wuhrer) escapes from her abusive boyfriend J-Rod (Joel Bissonnette) to the big city of Toronto after giving up her newborn baby for adoption. She ends up sleeping on the streets encountering prostitute Ola (Rae Dawn Chong) and pimp Hassan (Lou Diamond Phillips). Ola finally relents and takes her in. Hassan kills one of his girls which is witnessed by Ola and another guy. Police detective McClaren (Lance Henriksen) investigates.

This is an odd little exploitation movie. It tries to be hard and gritty. However, it comes off as a knockoff of a dirty 70's B-movie. Hassan is walking around with his cane and pimp gear. Even some of the cars are more 70s and 80s. The Chinese witness is in his stereotype kitchen gear. People are warming themselves with trash fires. Hookers are walking the streets. It's like a 70s movie dropped in the middle of 90s Toronto. The acting is uneven. I like Rae Dawn Chong. Kari Wuhrer is trying too hard to be the damsel in distress. The two women have some good moments and had potential to be something more. Lou Diamond Phillips is ridiculously pimplicious. This is definitely a B-movie.

In their harsh world, the regulars on the Boulevard engage in a minute to minute struggle against each other. The story presents action and reaction, with no intellectual depth or analysis. The Boulevard boasts a selection of hookers, drag queens, junkies, pimps, cops, murderers and rapists, all mistrusting each other, all dangerously defensive. Despite this, the most violent and sexually explicit scenes are those of Jennifers flashbacks to her messy past, before she came to the Boulevard. Jennifer lands homeless after a series of traumatic events; she's just given birth, adopted her baby out, run away from her abusive partner, and given up all her money for a bus ticket to Toronto. A local working girl feels sorry for her so takes her in. Performance ranks as one of the better features of Boulevard. I've never seen Kari Wuhrer play a part so well. Lance Henriksen and Lou Diamond Phillips were damn memorable. Hahah. The quality of the film crashes when it comes to relationship development. Broad insults, verbal abuse, sex and physical violence sum up almost all character interaction. Even the budding 'love' between Jennifer and Ola seemed more like a convenient, mutually-rewarding 'arrangement'. The ugly ending only exemplified Boulevard as one of the cheaply effective 90's-classic tragedy genre. But still, quite good.

Kari Wuhrer is Jennefer, a spousally battered woman, who takes to the streets of Toranto to escape her past where she meets Ola (Rae Dawn Chong) a 'hooker with a heart of gold' who takes her under her wing. Of course it's only a matter of time before Jen starts turning tricks herself, which she does. But the mean old pimp (Lou Diamond Phillips, marginally better here than he was in "Bats") may mess up the budding relationship that Jen and Olga are starting up (yea they're lesbian 'girl power' yay). Lance Henriksen is also on hand, and sadly wasted, as a cop. If you took out the nudity (which would also cut out any reason why any guy would watch this), this would make a film that Lifetime would LOVE.

Eye Candy: Kari Wuhrer gets fully nude (you have to sit through pretty much all of this turd to see it though); Amber Lea Weston shows her right tit extremely briefly, and Rea Dawn Chong gets topless (ok, the last one isn't really a selling point)

My Grade: D-

Where I saw it: FLIX

There's some nice cinematography and atmosphere. The film makes you feel the cold of the Toronto streets where the prostitutes ply their trade. It has a nice streets of the city, Scorsese "Taxi Driver" atmosphere.

Unfortunately the characters, despite some nice acting by the cast, are pretty one dimensional. They are constantly doing things that are required by the script, but make no sense. For example, why does the lead character Jennifer stand freezing on a street after arriving in Toronto instead of getting help? Why does she go with a pimp (Lou Diamond Philips) who she has seen abusing women, including her best friend, Ola. Why does her best friend, Ola, befriend the prostitutes on the street, but not report the pimp to the police when he kills a prostitute? Why does the pimp kill the prostitute? Why does the cop threaten to kill the pimp whom he knows is a murderer, but does not arrest him? Why does a ticket seller for Greyhound tell a psychotic looking boyfriend which bus she has taken, when he can just say, "I don't remember." The answer is that they are following a script that makes them all look stupid at every turn.

The movie's solution to the prostitution problems it raises is simple. Prostitutes and abused girlfriends should get guns and kill their tormentors. Police should just turn a blind eye when this happens.

Three stars for the cinematography and acting. Zero for everything else.

Kari Wuhrer immediately gives up her new-born child to adoption and runs away from her abusive lover in this dark and bleak mess. Life on the streets of Toronto is tough though and she falls in with sadistic pimp Lou Diamond Phillips and psychologically tortured prostitute Rae Dawn Chong. The plot, what little there is, thickens when detective Lance Henriksen starts going after Phillips for killing one of his charges and Wuhrer's boyfriend starts a fevered search for her. The shoe-string production tries to intrigue by having somewhat notable names and then adding lots of violence and sexual situations. One of those films that should be avoided completely. Nothing to recommend here. Turkey (0 stars out of 5).