Innocenza colposa

This is one of those decent crime movies that few people have heard about. It has a lot going for it. I should rate it higher since the story kept my interest all the way both times I saw it (four years apart). The violence and profanity are not overdone, the main characters are very interesting and the story finishes with a unique twist.

Actually, that twist is something you have to ponder to determine whether it makes sense. I am not sure it did. You'd have to watch this again soon and check on a few things. It's either very clever or its totally unfair to the viewer, which is why I kept it at an '8."

It's nicely photographed and I bet it looks much better on a widescreen DVD than on the tape I viewed it on in the '90s. Liam Neeson and Laura San Giacomo star. I was familiar with the latter from the film, "Quigley Down Under." She's much more appealing in that film than this one. Neeson is almost always interesting to watch.

This British mystery film starred Liam Neeson and Laura San Giacomo (Pretty Woman) in an early the 1990s. While the film is set in Brighton, England in the late 1950s, the film has a startling mystery to solve as to who killed a famed art collector and the private detective's wife. I was stunned by the ending of the film itself. While the film steers the audience to one direction, the absolute truth wins in the end. I have to say that the film haunts you long after you watch it. Laura San Giacomo is an under-appreciated actress who wasn't utilized much as should have been. When she is on screen, she is captivating even in the end. Liam Neeson also does a fabulous job in this role as the private detective accused of murder. You should just have to be surprised!

I don't know if this story really belongs on the big screen. It would have been fine as an HBO special or something. However, the performers are better than one would expect in such a venue.

Liam Neeson is so likable, a tall hulking actor, he seems to loom over whatever scene he appears in. And what a face! His skull seems to have no glabella whatever, his nose droops down out of the middle of his forehead, and yet he's handsome too, in a plain, masculine way, kind of like Spencer Tracy -- no glamor boy, but easy to look at. His voice too is appealing, with its Irish grace notes. And he can act too! Unlike so many brutishly big action stars, this guy can project a smelly sweaty fear, and do it without seeming ridiculous or seeming any weaker than the rest of us would be.

Laura San Giacomo is an apt mismatch for Neeson. Here, in this tale set in 1959, her face is wide and her expressive eyes long and thin. She wears so much makeup she's funereally pale and her Chinese red lip rouge suggests a figure from a Dracula movie. She's tiny standing next to Neeson. His presence makes her look even more elfin, as if he could crunch one of her long bones in his fist. She has a smooth and seductive voice that doesn't sound quite believable. It's hard to forget she's acting. But it doesn't detract from her attractivness. She seems never to have found her proper niche in films; neither, for that matter, has Neeson. They both deserve better than they've gotten, with some exceptions.

The plot is about a couple of murders, a near hanging, a strained friendship, a love affair or two, shots ring out, you're not supposed to carry an unlicensed gun in Britain, can I really trust him/her?, and all together has more twists to it than a corkscrew. Towards the end there is an execution scene that is very crudely done but intensely gripping all the same. (The crosscuts are dizzying.)

I won't give away the ending. Ordinarily the resolution of the plot isn't really as important as what's led up to it, but in this case the end is the best part of the film, or at least the most surprising.

Watching this movie wasn't a waste of time. But, Great Merciful Heavens, I'll never go to Brighton on holiday.

i want to give a STRONG plug for this very fine film that has received almost no acclaim. if you enjoy cinematic plot twists and suspense, sexuality and greed, but not blood and guts, this is a film you should see. when i say it keeps you guessing up till the last minute, i mean just that. art, money, sex, mistresses, wives, good cops, bad cops, murder! got it all-give it a try.

Most of "Under Suspicion" was very good but ...

A few minor shortcomings have already been noted, such as the use of Brighton locales in 1990 that had changed since 1959 and the up-market house in a setting that was nothing like Sussex (it was in Portmeirion, apparently).

In retrospect the opening scenes seemed implausible - a policeman undertaking surveillance leaving his post for a, extedned sex session with the target's wife.

But the film really fell to pieces in the last 15 minutes or so, with the frenetic house search, that frantic last-second dash to the prison and the later encounter in the prison courtyard that would never have been allowed in real life.

The ultimate twist was a jaw-dropper and made me think back to see if the actions that it revealed could have actually happened. Perhaps watching the film again would enable some of the loose-fitting pieces in the plot jigsaw to mesh, but I have my doubts.