'Murder at 1600' is a stock plot-driven film

By Laksmi Pamuntjak-Djohan

JAKARTA (JP): "Are you a Republican or a Democrat?" asks U.S. National Security Adviser Alvin Jordan (Alan Alda, Everyone says I love you) to homicide detective Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes, Dead Zone). Regis rewards this coy attempt at banter with a laugh, at once underscoring his "don't-take-me-as-a-fool" cockiness as well as the futility of the question.

Indeed, the current administration has further blurred the fine line separating the two, rendering the once comprehensible distinction amorphous at best. President Jack Neil (a perpetually flurried Ronny Cox) may look as decrepit as George Bush, and all his Hawkish minions -- from Alan Alda down to the rancid, Patton- like, Head of White House Security Nick Spikings (Daniel Benzali, Murder Me) -- are all sterling graduates of the Newt Gingrich School of Evanescent Amiability. Yet, despite his obvious age, Jack Neil is the primary contender of Wimp of The Year -- an appellation most likely claimed by a baby boomer -- since he has never served in the army.

Never mind the discrepancies. We all know that Hollywood is fickle. Before the elections, the White House genre got the full- on, romanticized treatment, not only portraying the U.S. president as young, gorgeous, idealistic, and "thoroughly human", but actually making the entire film about him. Rob Reiner's The American President was indeed a handsome divertissement, a sophisticated piece of propaganda filled with bright-faced, beautiful, liberal, contemporary people who extol the baby boom sensibilities that sent Republicans screaming blue murder in protracted Crossfire debates.

But, no sooner did Contract with America get stuffed into the dustbin that a deluge of scandals started to gnaw at Clinton's infallibility portrait, exposing cracks that evoke more than passing resemblance to the 1960s scandal that rocked a nation. Hollywood, not one to miss the p.c. train, follows suit. All of a sudden, the genre has been turned into the indisputable landfill of all things sleazy and morbid.

But it is a fair enough deal. For every rose-tinted fable of democracy, expect one or perhaps two, up to three conspiracy thrillers slogging to convey a morality tale of yet another ordinary citizen triumphing against the lewd and corrupt machinations of government. Hence, November Conspiracy, Absolute Power, and now Murder at 1600 -- all in the space of a year.

But does it reveal anything new about the nature of power? Does it try to make some salient, punctilious point about the demoralizing effects of it all? Does it try to offer anything new beyond its well-worn premise? What's more, is it another ego trip by an aging legend longing to make a political statement?

The answer is no. But does it really matter? Murder at 1600, quite simply, is a modest, entirely plot-driven film without an ounce of wit, a stab at satire, or a hint of stylistic ambition. It moves at a near-uniform pace, like a mechanical flowchart poised for a few manufactured jolts toward the end. Everything about it, in fact, smells of a B-grade movie.

Action Director Dwight Little's CV explains why it is so: directing Jean-Claude van Damme in Marked for Death and the late Brandon Lee in Rapid Fire doesn't exactly qualify him for loftier ideals, although his inability to inject suspense to what is essentially a suspense movie really beats me.

The detective hero -- the kind who gets shown in the film's opening scene single-handedly outmaneuvering a suicidal maniac and equating historical savvy with owning yards of miniature battlefields at home -- can be played just as funkily by, say, Eddie Murphy. But, Wesley Snipes is one classy dude, and it is clear that he tries to jazz-up an otherwise stock Hollywood action hero formula with a brooding, laissez-faire, self- deprecating intelligence. The result is rather different -- he comes off more menacing than intelligent -- but just as effective.

Diane Lane, in a career renaissance as Snipes' Secret Agent sidekick Nina Chance, is trim, taut and terrific. She also does a pretty believable job of outsmarting, outrunning and outshooting everybody on her heels.

But, like everything else -- the cinematography, the music, the dialog -- the acting is "ordinary". So "ordinary", in fact, that we think the answer cannot be as simple. It can't be, with such an inherently arrogant premise.

Take the foreign policy issue, for instance. For credibility's sake, of course the nation has to have a... hostage crisis, right? Libya has been done before, so after spinning the globe a couple of times, the fateful finger of random selection falls on... North Korea. But, instead of existing as a mere pussyfooting device to cover up plot holes, this issue is part of the high-concept, painfully straightforward thought it is: a president faces a challenge to which he's not suited to rise. The issue is an important one, and that explains why it is introduced early in the movie.

But do we pay much attention to it? Barely. To us, the issue oozes the pungent odor of manipulation, is too cheesy for our taste, and we're just not going to fall for it. The pitch stays the same anyway. A woman is mysteriously murdered in the White House, a seasoned homicide detective is called to investigate, everybody is covering something up, the Number One and his son are implicated, the detective grinds on, and gets to announce "Whodunit" in front of every party involved in the usual kick ass Hollywood fashion. Well, if the President is implicated midway, the conspiracy must be leveled against him, right?

Whatever. Do we really care? No, most probably not, as long as there are the requisite chases and shoot-outs -- of which there are some.

So when the final twist catches us slightly by surprise, we lean back in our seats and say, "Oh well, that was kind of obvious, wasn't it?" while secretly acknowledging that it was, yet we just weren't aware of it until... well... until the movie revealed it to us.