Target

This is a great action/thriller that should not be missed. Hackman is an absolute gem as a modern day "dad" confronted with his past. The storyline and dialogue are fast crisp and move along at an ever increasing pace. There's no need to think. Just watch and let the film grip you and take you on a thrill ride into the Cold War and how one man can affect the present with the talents of his past. A great supporting cast and excellent "mood" photography. Gayle Hunnicutt is beautiful and Matt Dillon so convincing you sometimes want to smack him. Gene Hackman is one one our most versatile and distinguished actors and if you want to see him do his thing; here it is. Enjoy and congrats to Arthur Penn for brilliant direction.

The concentration on character and family values in Arthur Penn's spy thriller ought to make it a better, more intelligent movie, but somehow it doesn't work. Gene Hackman is an ex-CIA spy who's been "in from the cold" for 15 years. But now his wife has been kidnapped in Paris, and he has to get back into top gear in order to retrieve her. He also has to tell the truth about his past to his 18 year old son (Matt Dillon), who hitherto has thought his dad as much a man of action as Mr Magoo. There are all the contrivances we expect in this genre of film - repeated attempts on Hackman's life; car chases; femmes fatales; CIA agents who might be working for the other side; etc, etc. But little tension is developed, and first the recriminations and then the bonding between Hackman and Dillon simply slow the action down. I found the climax a tad ludicrous, but by that time didn't care much.

This movie is often dismissed as just an average Cold War spy flick. But in fact it is quite a bit more than that. It can well hold its own, thanks to the solid direction and first-rate performances by Hackman and Dillon.

These two never disappoint and seem to have had fun working together. They relaxedly fill in all the little character incongruities.

The story is interesting, but could have used much more exact local detail instead of this chain of insipid cutouts from travel brochures. The locals, but also the spies talk and behave like cardboard figures and tend to lessen the atmosphere a little. The same goes for a lot of the locations.

Recommended for fans of Dillon and Hackman, but also for those of you who like a solid spy movie.

Missed seeing this film over the years as I am a big fan of Gene Hackman, (Walter Llyod/Duke Potter),"Absolute Power", who plays the role as the average husband and wife with a son who is not very close to his father at all. Matt Dillon,(Chris Llyod/Derek Potter),"Loverboy", plays the son and Gayle Hunnicutt(Donna Llyod) "Dream Lover", is the wife who tries her very best to get her Walter to become closer to their son Chris. Donna disappears while she is on a tour in a foreign country and then the story gets quite complicated with lots of guns going off and plenty of car chases and great photograph in Germany and France. This film builds you up as you start getting interested and sort of goes down hill real fast. I like Gene Hackman and that is the only reason I decided to finish seeing this film.

I'm a sucker for espionage movies filmed on location in Europe, so I was positively inclined toward this film, which I had never heard of before it cropped up on cable this week. I'm not sure how I missed it back in 1985, because I'm a Hackman fan and usually like movies of this type.

This is an OK film, but not a great one. The locations are superb, and there are enough car chases to keep guys like me happy. The basic idea of the film (family of man with secret past must pay for his actions) is all right, too, but it plays out in a rather clunky way. (The story, by the way, was written by Leonard Stern, the executive producer of the GET SMART TV show, and the co-inventor of "Mad Libs".)

Hackman is the best part of the picture. Josef Sommer is also good, but is basically playing the same role he played in WITNESS (also in 1985). He could phone in a part like this. What drags this movie down is the thoroughly annoying Matt Dillon subplot. I'm not sure if it's just Dillon the actor that bothers me, or his character. The screenwriters try to turn this film into a family drama, where the father is reconciled to his son while they search for the kidnapped mother. But the son is SO stupid and annoying, that if I were Gene Hackman, I'd let the KGB put Dillon in a cement overcoat and toss him in the Baltic. IMHO, this would have been a better film with Hackman searching by himself (along with his former lover, perhaps, who is a more interesting character than Dillon).

The closing climactic scene drags on WAY too long. The tension is gone long before it's over, and the fade-out shot of the cuddly family is trite. (If you think about it, they're still in a LOT of trouble at that point, probably more than an hour before!) A much better film with a similar plot (and good locations) is the Harrison Ford vehicle FRANTIC. For spy fans, TARGET is worth watching once, but won't bear repeating.