Film Review: Quicksand (2003)
Film making, like any business, can attract characters whose entrepreneurial spirit doesn’t go hand in hand with their willingness to follow the law. In the past there were news reports about film productions being used as an excuse for embezzlements, tax frauds, money laundering or worse. A fictional event of such nature serves as premise for Quicksand, 2003 thriller directed by John Mackenzie.
The protagonist, played by Michael Keaton, is Martin Raikes, US bank compliance officer sent to South of France to investigate possible wrongdoings of a film production. There he meets film company executive Lela Forin (played by Judith Godreche) who introduces him to Jake Mellows (played by Michael Caine), washed up action star who hopes that the film he is making would represent his come back. Raikes, however, soon discovers that the whole production is a farce, and that Forin’s company serves as a front for Russian mob operations that involves illegal pornography, weapons smuggling and drug trade. Raikes is offered bribe to look the other way, but when he refuses it, Russian mob boss Oleg Boutraskaya (played by Rade Šerbedžija) decides to get rid of nosy American by framing him for murder and even hiring Mellows to unwittingly threaten Reikes by suggesting that mob has abducted his daughter Emma (played by Clare Thomas).
Scottish director John Mackenzie used to enjoy a lot of respect for his 1980 film The Long Good Friday, which is widely acknowledged as a classic of a gangster genre. Nobody would mistake Quicksand for anything of the same quality nor anyone would be too surprised to find this to be his last feature film. While the script had interesting idea, its execution was poor, mainly due to Mackenzie being too tired or unable to deal with serious budget limitations. He had good cast at his disposal, mainly always dependable Michael Keaton and Michael Caine, an actor with whom he had worked in much better films like The Honorary Consul and The Fourth Protocol. Caine, who is usually one of the most dependable actors, said that he had enjoyed the shooting at his favourite locations of South of France, but it turns out that his enthusiasm got the best of him, turning this film into unintentional parody of itself. Caine’s performance is in sharp contrast to Croatian actor Rade Šerbedžija, who delivers another one-note performance as Russian villain, which became his speciality at the latter stages of his career. Keaton looks quite good compared to them, but even he can’t work around the script that takes simply too much cliches for the plot and characters to be taken seriously. Perhaps one day someone would make a good film about film productions going bad, but if most of those efforts are like Quicksand, chances for that look slim.
RATING: 2/10 (-)
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