Cold Heart

I came home last night from band practice with my tail dragging; it wears me out. I was surprised to find my wife up at 11:30. She said she'd had trouble sleeping. So I made some popcorn and we flipped through the channels. This movie was just starting. In its way, it's a real gem. The characters are all so ridiculous that they're like comic book characters; but I mean that in a good way. The movie wisely stays focused tightly on just a handful of characters: Kinski, a professional woman working for a company that does I'm not quite sure just what (brokerage, I think?); her analyst husband; the young pyscho who works for her firm AND is a patient of the analyst; and Kinski's assistant, an impossibly sexy and overly-made-up blonde.

The psycho is almost too goofy at the start, with his leering smile and his oh-so-perfect hair. He accompanies Kinski on a business trip, and finds it laughably easy to get her to have a drink, then to slam shots, and finally to go to bed with him. (One is surprised that her clothes don't literally fly off her, she's so obviously eager to be seduced.) The next fifteen minutes of the movie shift to softcore porn with plenty of groping and breasts and buttocks (none of which are Kinski's, I'm guessing).

Then the movie proper begins. Blah blah, back home, blah blah, she's made a mistake, blah blah, he won't take no for an answer. And there's something not...quite...right about the husband.

Anyway, the whole things gets resolved in an anti-climax at a rustic cabin the analyst has just presented to Kinski, purportedly to atone for his failings as a husband that had led her to the arms of another. The ending turns into comedy, almost slapstick, with some funny lines that are made even funnier because the movie gave no hint that it, like the young psycho, is completely schizophrenic.

All in all, this was a pretty cheesy movie, and if you were taking it seriously from the beginning, you would probably find yourself annoyed with it. We both watched it because it was late, there was nothing better to do, and we just wanted to be entertained. And we were.

It's good for a few laughs, if you're light-tempered enough to enjoy bad things. And even if you don't laugh, it's still moderately entertaining. And, OH! Don't you just love a twist ending? This one actually surprised me, I wasn't expecting it. But maybe I was too distracted by the anime eyes of our resident psycho (Holloway).

Kinski is rather subdued - maybe sedated - through the picture and Fahey is very grim and serious the whole way through.

But for a "psycho seduces unhappy wife of his shrink and she rejects him and all hell breaks loose" kind of movie, it's not all that bad. Just don't expect anything Oscar worthy.

Nastassja Kinski seems to be making a career out of playing the bored wife who has an affair with a younger man...who then tries to kill her. Seriously, "Cold Heart" follows the plotline of her other film "Say Nothing" very closely. And then there is "Blind Terror," which is the same basic plot, with very minor differences.

Actually, in some ways, "Cold Heart" is the best of the three. There is a clever plot twist towards the end which I was not expecting. It is not fully fleshed out and explained, but it's an interesting idea. Josh Holloway is on the verge of playing a good psychotic...but he reverts to the same maniacal smile too many times to bring much depth to the role. Jeff Fahey has a thankless part, and seems bored playing it. Nastassja...well, I think she too is bored, and why wouldn't she, since she played the same role in three different movies, all released within a year of each other. She looks good, but for Nastassja fans, there is nothing particularly intriguing that she brings to this part. There is no one scene that stands out.

It is what it is...a made for video thriller.

Its low budget VHS or early CD style quality movie. with some decent performance for that budget movie. The movie also has very surprise ending. which is kinda nice.

The movie plot is not that new, its same married wife with passionless marriage. and then hookup with someone , which goes wrong later. and also estranged rich husband. there are many movies like that in 90s era , with more erotic style.

this movie lacks sex scenes or nude sense. but anyhow its ok.. the movie is exciting and very good in the end too,.

For all the negative comments, it looks like if you follow Nastassja Kinski nobody likes the movie, but I had never heard of any of these actors and just caught the movie on cinemax. Its not another skin flick, you have to watch the movie to realize the topic is completly adult to begin with, and the sex scenes are very necessary to portrait what the director wants us to see.

The movie I think is very well done, the psychotic patient that gets released and ends up with his doctors wife, only to cause a mess of problems. The patient is brilliant, he will let his girl do whatever she wants, in exchange for his full attention as well (something close =b). As soon she changes her mind, it gets messy. He also has some psycic sensitivity as you watch the film. The interactions between the psychiatrists husband and wife is believable for somebody who is blinded by emotion, and the husband knows how to play on it (or avoid it) just like little kids avoid situations.

This movie has so many brilliant mini aspects of it, I dont understand how its getting a 4.0/10.0, it is deserving of much more. If you watch the movie for the thrill of a movie I would hate it too, you have to watch it to get into the characters head to appreciate this movie, or else most of the plot basis is gone, leaving an empty movie with some funky things happening.