Starring: Bruce Willis, Sarah Jessica Parker, Dennis Farina, Tom
Sizemore, Robert Pastorelli
Director: Rowdy Herrington
Producers: Arnon Milchan, Hunt Lowry, and Tony Thomopoulos
Screenplay: Rowdy Herrington and Martin Kaplan
Music: Brad Fiedel
Released by Columbia Pictures
A guy with a name like Rowdy Herrington had better make a more impressive film than this if he doesn't want his name to get confused with that of a professional wrestler.
Tom Hardy (Bruce Willis) is a cop on Pittsburgh's water rescue squad whose discovery of bodies floating down the river causes him to revisit an ugly and tragic past. Two years ago, he lost his detective's shield when he claimed that the murder of his father, Police Chief Hardy (John Mahoney), was committed by a cop. No one believed him, and the force as a whole labelled him a turncoat. Now, Tom has a new partner, Jo Christman (Sarah Jessica Parker), who accepts that Hardy's story may be more than a fantasy, and together the two begin an illegal investigation of a new series of murders, which Tom believes are inextricably linked to the chain of events that resulted in his father's death and his own disgrace.
Disappointment abounds for anyone expecting Die Hard on water. The only similarity is actor Bruce Willis, but this film is sadly lacking both the slick direction of the Die Hard movies and the entertaining script. For Striking Distance, we get a routine cop story, complete with far too many chases, moments that stretch the viewer's credulity past the breaking point, and few legitimate surprises. The action is depressingly routine, and Bruce Willis has only one or two opportunities for wisecracking, which is clearly one of his strengths.
Actually, for the first half of the movie, the plot doesn't seem all that bad. It's full of cliches, but that's to be expected, and it contains far too many stock situations, but that shouldn't surprise anyone, either. However, any shred of competence shown by the early script unravels as the movie speeds to its ridiculous conclusion. The scene revealing the killer's identity is asinine.
Perhaps someone could tell me why Sarah Jessica Parker, who really isn't a bad actress, would take this thankless role (the standard answer to this question is "money"). This is a prototypical "token female". Not only is Jo totally uninteresting, but she's stupid. It's sad to see anyone in a part this poor, but even more distressing when the performer isn't some no-name actress in her first major motion picture.
Bruce Willis, who has shown moments of undeniable ability (In Country, while not a great film, was a tour de force for the actor), is irritating throughout Striking Distance. Some of it surely has to do with his character: a morose, self-centered man with a drinking problem. (Why do these movies always have to have alcoholic heroes?) There are a couple of solid scenes where Willis stays within himself, but those are few and far between.
The opening car chase is enjoyable, even if much of it is close to self-parody (I was reminded of Last Action Hero). After that, however, everything settles into the usual action film routine. There are about two more chases than necessary -- one on land and one in the water. No one could accuse Herrington of anything close to originality. He goes strictly by-the-book, churning out a picture that is pure formula, with a generous does of idiocy thrown in.
There are a lot of other bad things I could talk about -- the overblown score, the silly portrayal of the police, the bad dialogue, the poor lighting in almost every scene -- but I think it's pretty clear how few virtues Striking Distance has. In fact, one of the movie's few positive aspects is that it's too loud to fall asleep during, which is surely what most people would do if their attention was based on story and character.
© 1993, 1996 James Berardinelli