Haven't seen too much on Double Jeopardy... I think we've just had a couple of reports over time. So here we have a test screening look at the film, and I just want to say that this is just one person's opinion, we'll have to hang on till we can hear more opinions on the flick... Alright? Cool, here we go with Thetan's look...
Double Jeopardy
Director: Bruce Beresford
Writer: Robert Benton
Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Ashley Judd
Rating: ½ star (out of four stars)
Ashley Judd plays a wife who wakes up on her new sailboat and discovers a fresh pool of blood in place of her husband who had been lying in the bed beside her hours before. She, in true Hollywood fashion, foolishly and for no reason, picks up the bloody murder weapon just as the authorities arrive out of the darkness. A spotlight shines on her as a booming voice from an off-screen megaphone tells her to, "Put down the knife maam."
"Double Jeopardy" is the kind of film that expects the audience to switch off its collective brain and ignore its ludicrousness.
Tommy Lee Jones follows up "U.S. Marshals" by playing a carbon copy of his Oscar winning Sam Gerard character from "The Fugitive." He travels across country to track-convicted murderer Ashley Judd, but he's always a little smarter than you think. Does this sound at all familiar? The twist this time is that Jones takes a nip from a flask once in a while, though his obvious alcoholism is never addressed so as not to slow down the Brontosaurus plot.
Another departure from logic asks the audience to believe that Jones is able to recruit not only the New Orleans police force, but also the entire city in a manhunt for Judd who is a parole violator. Now maybe I'm wrong, but aren't most major cities overloaded with people who have violated their parole? I'd hate to see how New Orleans would go after someone who had committed a recent crime.
Not much thought went into this script. I am hoping that I have been given bad information and that the great Robert Benton ("Kramer vs. Kramer") did not write it. I walked out of the theater depressed for having wasted my time. In its defense, it is still in the workprint stage, but unfortunately there is not just one little problem here and there, the whole thing is a mess.
One last question. Why was this film shot in the scope aspect ratio 2.35 - 1? When I first looked up at the ultra-wide projected image I was ready for "Lawrence of Arabia." I should have been so lucky.
Thetan
