U-Turn Review
by Larry Mcgillicuddy (ZMDZ57C AT prodigy DOT com)October 17th, 1997
U-Turn
Review by Larry McGillicuddy
Copyright Larry McGillicuddy
**1/2 (out of 4)
Directed by Oliver Stone
<BR>Starring Sean Penn, Jennifer Lopez, Nick Nolte, Billy Bob Thornton, Joaquin Phoeniz, Claire Danes, Jon Voight,
Oliver Stone is one of my favorite filmmakers. His past films - Salvador, Platoon, Born on the 4th of July, Natural Born Killers, and JFK - have been among the best of the last 12 years. They've all made some sort of political or thematic statement and usually caused controversy. This time out, Stone seems intent on just making a cool modern noir thriller. Unfortunately, the same things that have made his past films great work against him here.
Sean Penn stars as Bobby Cooper, a drifter whose car breaks down in the small desert town of Superior, Arizona. He meets several offbeat characters, who thwart his attempts to escape from Superior. He catches the eye of the mysterious vixen Jennifer Lopez, but unbeknownst she has a husband with more than a few screws loose. He also runs into a flirty teenager played by Claire Danes, whose boyfriend goes insane whenever she's around another guy.
This story is sort of like a demented acid trip cross between Doc Hollywood and Red Rock West. The problem is, I think Stone's material isn't strong enough this time around, and his directorial style, while visually stunning, fails to create a true sense of suspense or fear. The first hour is impressive enough, introducing us to the many offbeat characters, the most memorable being Claire Danes and a strange mechanic played by Billy Bob Thornton. The movie falls apart in the last 30 minutes, when it goes way overboard with one moronic twist after another, none of which make much sense in retrospect.
U-Turn features brilliant performances by nearly everyone in the cast and there are several exciting sequences. Unfortunately, it fails to come together in the conclusion, which just piles one twist on top of another. So after making meaningful and controversial films the past 2 decades, Oliver Stone just wanted to make an entertaining offbeat thriller. He was almost successful.
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