Crime Em Nova York

True Blue (2001) is typical standard fare for action film. A loose cannon police officer gets involved with a pretty young woman who may possibly be involved in case he's investigating.

Three young boys find a severed hand hanging to a boat in a Central Park pond. Rem Macy (Tom Berenger) is the investigation. The investigation will lead Macy into the underworlds of the city. Many of the local politicians are involved in the shady underground.

Nikki, the roommate of the murder victim asks to stay at Macy's place. He accepts figuring that it will be safe for Nikki. Now, Macy has to use his head and make sure other parts of his anatomy don't cloud his judgement.

True Blue has some nice twists and turns, as well as a fine performance from Tom Berenger (Major League). The film is decent enough for a viewing, but not a movie that I would rewatch.

"True Blue", just another Berenger B-flick, is a noir wannabe in which he plays a homicide detective with a past who's trying to get to the bottom of a murder mystery while trying to avoid the bottom of a blond tart involved with the case. This budget conscious flick fleshes out only half the characters in its convoluted and messy plot, relegating the other half to the backstory or endless conversation about the goings-on of a bunch of bad guys we don't get to see. "True Blue" is the kind of flick you might want to watch on late night tv when your choices are limited to vampires and old movies. (C)

Anyone familiar with the works of writer/director J.S. Cardone will doubtless know that the man never seems to rest on his laurels for long, having filmed this cop thriller hot on the heels of his vampire yarn "The Forsaken".

Now herein lies the question, director Cardone is prolific yes, dabbling in a variety of genres, now aside from gigs like "Shadowzone" "The Slayer" and "Crash And Burn" written or directed by Cardone down through the last two decades, the vast majority of the man's work has mainly consisted of dark and brooding thrillers, whereby deep beneath the surface of the story, lurks many a festering heart.

Such is the case with "True Blue" starring Tom Berenger as Detective Rembrandt "Rem" Macy another one of those hard drinking,chain smoking cops on the edge. Now when i first looked at the cover for this movie, i thought to myself, where is Tom Berenger, Looking at the front of the cover you'll find a cosmetically reconstructed Tom looking kinda like Huckleberry Hound, when you flip over to read the synopsis, you catch sight of the real Mr Berenger, gone to pot and a looking like both "Platoon" and "Someone To Watch Over Me" had never hapened!

If you were to say that this was thriller, reading the front and back of the video/dvd cover would indeed make you believe so. However this is just another steak dinner swimming around in Tom's gut.

No harm no fowl to anybody involved in this movie, as i like anyone, loves a good yarn, but Cardone has not done us any favours here by parading an endless dislay of situations wrapped up in a scenario that could've popped up in anything from Homicide to NYPD Blue.

An Ironic twist kicking around in this movie, is the lead character's name, unlike his famous other, Rem Macy is most definitely no oil painting, which was also mirrored in his living habits. I guess in hindsight the casting of Berenger was a stroke of genius, as he was looking in need of the work.

Watch this movie and remember the scene in "Platoon" when Berenger's character and Willem Dafoe's square off in the vietnamese village, you wonder could Dafoe maybe sometime pay Berenger a visit and slap some sense into him, and perhaps be a bit more choosy about his next role, which judging by his character's chain smoking habit, could be the next advert warning upon the perils of killing your lungs!

But hey this was only a movie, take it or leave it, until J.S. Cardone conjurs up his next slice of over ripe hokum.

A tough cop is taken off a major drug case because of his 'cowboy' antics and finds himself assigned to a case where all he has is a severed hand floating in the water. Luckily for him the hand still had fingers so the prints lead us to a missing city hall employee.

Exploring the girl's past leads us into involvement with a Chinese drug gang which are hero has reason to detest. Next we are led to a pedophiliac elected official, blackmail, several dancers, some murders and dirty cops.

Berenger carries the film singlehandedly and it follows a predictable course until the end. The 10 minute conclusion takes us thru more twists than most mystery writers can concoct in several novels so most viewers should come away well satisfied.

I'm unsure as to what I really think of this film. I enjoyed watching it, though it was in reality nothing special. It started rather slowly, and for the longest time you are not sure what the story is about. Are we watching Tom's character, Rem, falling in love, ruining his career, or is the film about the investigation and finding the baddy! Well neither story really worked out. The plot through out the film is complicated and about persons you don't see at all in the movie, though the ending (at least to me) was a surprise (one of this time when you think you've cracked it, but then there is one final twist!). And the love story was unbelievable and looked more like a middle aged man getting turned on by a teen. However, there was something about the film that still kept me interested, so like I say, I'm not completely clear as to how to judge it. I think what maybe kept the film both interesting and enjoyable was very good acting by Lori Heuring, playing the girl Nikki. 5/10