Fair Game

Okay, so the screenplay wasn't really Sidney Lumet, and the two leads were in bad need of an acting class, but you can't say this movie wasn't entertaining. It was campy! Everyone in the cast talked like they were reading off a chalkboard somewhere, making it hilarious. What's more (or to add good expectations for the male side) you get a full glimpse of Cindy Crawford's bare breasts and the millionth Baldwin brother to take a shot at acting. (And without a surprise, this shot proved blank.) Don't take this as something serious; look at it as the "Plan 9 Of Outer Space" for Hollywood action movies. If you have to poke fun an it, you could, but take the whole thing like a grain of salt.

Invite some friends over, leave your brain at the door, get a few beers and Chinese take-out and prepare yourself for a blast!

The plot was stupid and the acting was so bad. Cindy Crawford can absolutely not act. And the movie didn't even have any decent nude scenes. If the people responsible for this movie are going to subject us to such garbage they can at least throw in some decent nudity so that the movie won't be a total loss.

This is bad, very bad. It must have sounded like a good idea at the time: "Die Hard With Legal Mumbo-Jumbo" with a twist: we'll have a sexy model as the star.

Erm, it sounds good on paper, and perhaps it would have been a good idea if they hadn't screwed the damn thing up by giving us a weak script, even weaker plot, weaker villians and then give up on the sexy model as John McClane and turn her into a damsel in distress.

It almost feels like Producer, Joel Silver is satirizing or parodying himself in the constant need for set-piece action after set-piece action strung together on the weakest thing to ever grace the screen.

Everything that hits something explodes, cars hit telegraph poles and explode violently, tree's that are in the way explode even more violently...its almost too much to take in. I know action is what was driving hollywood around the early 90s - but this is just TOO much.

Anyway, the film pretty much nose-dives when Crawford - who looks stunning - turns into a damsel in distress with Baldwin acting like he's painting by numbers - just doing the thing because either Stallone dropped out or because of the money.

Not even the "sex-scenes" can save this terrible affair. Not even Berkov, now type-cast as Russian bad guys, can save it. Everything hurts...everything. The end explosion looks kinda cool, but it can't mask the fact that this film is flimsy at best - and at worst? Well, I just don't wanna think about that.

They could have made it a lot better than this trash. A die-hard with a woman as the hero could have been done a lot better. Its a shame with the buckloads of money they wasted on this trash seems to have gone onto Crawford's make-up.

My Rating: 0/10

Before it careens into total silliness, `Fair Game' is a lot of fun. After the rather absurd attempted shooting of Crawford in the opening scene, `Fair Game' begins rather effectively examining the loss of privacy in the digital world, a fresh idea in 1995 (`Enemy of the State' didn't arrive till three years later). Crawford plays a lawyer specializing in civil cases. While helping one of his divorce clients she inadvertently falls under the scrutiny of a group of former KGB assassins. William Baldwin (`Backdraft')is the cop assigned to protect her. Baldwin looks like a cross between his brother Alec and Nicholas Cage; in other words, kind of goofy. Cindy Crawford looks like …well, Cindy Crawford, one of the world's most beautiful women. Crawford received some pretty bad raps for this movie. That's really unfair, but not surprising, considering Hollywood's experience with supermodels. In the 50s, they used to dub supermodel Suzy Parker. Crawford's considerably better than that. Her voice and line readings remind me of early Farrah Fawcett.

The big problem here is neither Crawford nor Baldwin. It's a script that would have us believe former KGB operatives would miss Crawford with a machine gun as she stands by a storefront with no cover. It's a script that would have us believe KGB agents would blow up Crawford's house with C4 to cover a COVERT operation. It's the script that would give Baldwin endless supplies of 9mm ammunition, while he leaves behind machine guns and `street sweepers'. It's a script that has the intelligent, sensible Crawford running from Baldwin, her only ally. It's a script that would have us believe the feisty Crawford would surrender without a fight, etc., etc.

Production values for `Fair Game' are top notch, great color photography, sound, music, editing and stunts. Had producer Joel Silver substituted Jackie Chan for Billy Baldwin, `Fair Game' would have made a first rate martial arts movie, even with its other shortcomings. ‘Course, I'm not sure Cindy Crawford would've `gotten naked' for Jackie Chan. Well, topless, anyway.

`Fair Game' is a `dumb blonde' of a movie, but Crawford is anything but dumb. She deserved better and deserves another opportunity to prove her mettle as an actress. If she made another movie, I'd go see it, even if she become closer to an "8" than a "10".

Nonetheless, `Fair Game' is, at worst, a `fair' movie. I give it a `5'.

Before I start the review, I would just like to point out that Fair Game is not entirely bad because of Cindy Crawford's performance. Her acting is one note and monotone, but that's not the real reason why the film is bad.

The plot is so illogical it makes no sense at all. We are told that Crawford's character, Kate McQuean, is a Lawyer who has been marked for death by the KGB, the reason being they could lose their ship in a court case that McQuean is pursuing. This kind of story line would belong in a courtroom drama, not an action film. And why are the villains the KGB? This was 1995; the KGB was irrelevant by then. The film itself is one long chase, and concentrates more on action instead of paying attention to character detail, which is another of the film's failings.

The action scenes are well-staged, and are the only good point to Fair Game. But there are certain questions raised; for a start, how could the villains use electronic equipment to track every move they make? Not to mention the use of a heat sensor, which can allow the villains to see everything they do (since when has such a thing ever existed?). And by the time the villains have finally captured McQuean, they are then instructed to 'keep the girl alive'; why? You've just spent the whole time trying to kill her, why not just get it done and out the way? Instead we have to watch the story get dragged out for longer. By this point, you'll be glad when it's all over.

Only worth watching if you're curious about Cindy Crawford's acting debut.