Pursuit

I read Binary, Pursuit's first title, published under the pseudonym John Lange. Crichton published under a pseudonym because he was afraid his med school instructors would doubt his dedication to medicine (at that time he still wanted to be a doctor). The title Pursuit was ordered by the studio, fearing that the public would not understand the title Binary, and the general incomprehension about biowarfare agents in 1972 help land Crichton the Director's job. First run as an ABC TV movie of the week. Pursuit is fast paced with a surprisingly high powered cast: EG Marshall, Wm Windom, Ben Gazarra, and a young Martin Sheen as what may very well be the first role as the small screen's first computer hacker. It's a good TV thriller at least thirty years ahead of its time

I am surprised that no one has noticed that this film may have inspired 24 series, that's my own opinion at least. I appreciated this TV movie, very well paced but unfortunately too much foreesable, predictable. Good job anyway, no problem.

How this movie doesn't get more acclaim is strange.

The prophetic and imaginative Michael Crichton ("Andromeda Strain", "Coma", "WestWorld" directs his own screenplay. Michael Crichton had a prescience in his vision and this movie is no exception. Getting hung up on setting the movie "in the future" never presented a dilemma for Crichton. He just uses contemporary settings to bring the movie closer to home. The technology may be beyond our means, but it still affects us all today.

The movie stars brilliant and eclectic Ben Gazzara ("The Killing of a Chinese Bookie", "The Big Lebowski"), Storied great E.G. Marshall ("12 Angry Men", "Creepshow"), Prolific Martin Sheen ("Apocalypse Now", "The Dead Zone") and Television guest star William Windom ("Star Trek: The Doomsday Machine", "Escape from the Planet of The Apes").

The musical score is even composed by composer-great Jerry Goldsmith. Its reminiscent of "Hawaii 5-0", "McQ" or "The French Connection" a typical, but lively, 70s-style action cop-show movie background score. I love background scores like this. Its a really good one. The sunset of actual orchestral background scores.

The story revolves around a political activist-millionaire-terrorist who steals a large supply of nerve gas and threatens to release it in San Diego, which is hosting the Republican National Convention.

Sounds simple. The movie is really thrilling for a TV Movie, the story has a familiar contemporary feel, the acting and musical score are good. The movie was filmed in early 1970s San Diego and for anybody who loves or lives in San Diego (like me), the movie is a great archive piece to record how San Diego was 40 years ago. Much more watchable than "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes".

Could the movie have been better? Sure it could. It suffered from low-budget syndrome. Michael Crichton's visionary writing shakes most of the deficiencies the move has and makes this a great TV-Special...certainly one of my top 10-made for TV Movies of all time.

One of my local UHF channels showed this movie on a Saturday afternoon. Overall, it is very well done, especially for a made-for-TV movie. The movie moved along at a good pace and the acting was good all around. It is a little reminiscent of the early episodes of "Columbo". Ben Gazzara is pursuing E.G. Marshall, who he knows is planning to do something at a Democratic national convention in San Diego. The two repeatedly try to outwit each other, all the while knowing that the other guy is watching every move. This makes for some interesting plot twists and blind alleys. Crichton, as usual, pays very close attention to technological details, making the premise very realistic, unlike a lot of "caper" movies where plot hinges on an essential piece of knowledge the character could not possibly have had. I'm really surprised this hasn't been remade for the big screen, given Michael Crichton's popularity.

The iconic writer Michael Crichton had another book taken to screen about political fictional thriller, the premise is far-fetched by countless reasons, firstly for a politic extremist forego the democratic system to appeal to killing of thousand on political convention by hazardous gas stolen from US's Army, it sounds a bit weird to solve this neuralgic issue, second the cat and mouse game conceived by egocentric politician played by E. G. Marshall against the US' agent of intelligence Ben Gazzara to the extent of a character study upon psych profile.

The screenplay has plenty of noticeable holes, meanwhile E. G. Marshall sets free to built a bomb device thru an inertness of FBI's agents, looks like deliberate by pure foolishness to get a proper tension to hold the audience, to make it worst some oddities were appended in the lame plot, some catches wisely designed by the perpetrator in a bomb shut down process, it will raises the strain thru the countdown at last seconds, in the meantime the missing President is reaching in the crowed convention.

On the casting appears the upcoming star Martin Sheen at small role, someone wrote in his review that E. G. Marshall was miscasting to play a villain, whereby I agree, he doesn't fit well in this kind evil persona, the veteran actor often portraited a nice guy on serious character.

Thanks for reading.

Resume:

First watch: 1992 / How many: 2 / Source: TV-Youtube / Rating: 6.25.