Dead in the Water (1991)

Call it a sleeper or rare find, but this movie is one of the funniest I've seen. Smart, sexy and filled with twists and dark humor. If you liked Pritzi's Honor, you'll love this one. One of the first feature films w/Terri Hatcher and Brian Brown is wonderful as a lawyer who tries to commit the "perfect crime." The crime isn't, but the movie is. It makes me laugh every time I see it and I can't recall how many times I have. An excellent murder mystery, too -you'll love it!

This was actually made for cable TV back in 1991, but is well enough directed by Bill Condon to make it feel like a feature release. Based on a 50's hard-boiled pulp novel by the great Harry Whittington, Web of Murder, the movie stars Bryan Brown as hot shot attorney Charlie Deegan who's married to a rich wife played by Anne DiSalvo and who has a sexy secretary Laura (Teri Hatcher).

So there's the standard noir plot elements--lust and greed and murder. Yep. But the way they're put together here is sharp and nifty, with lots of juicy dark humor along the way, so this is a really fun movie.

Nice score--dig Satchmo's singing in the opening credits--and the acting, especially by major fly-in-the-ointment Veronica Cartwright (who puts a serious damper on Charlie's plans) is very strong.

A really good addition to your neo-noir collection, Dead in the Water is a great way to spend an hour and a half soaking up them noir vibes. Oh, yeah.

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For inspired casting, try putting Australian Bryan Brown--native accent intact--in the role of corrupt American lawyer Charlie Deegan whose marriage is crumbling and whose secretary is too luscious to ignore. What this does is highlight the corruption on display by playing up Charlie's personality to the max. Very smart.

Charlie comes up with a plan to get rid of his oh-so-wealthy wife that looks completely foolproof, but we all know that in these noir flicks, things NEVER go as planned. Do they? Nope. The plan is to bump her off, inherit her money and run off with Laura the luscious secretary. Unfortunately fate has other things in mind.

The direction here, by Bill Condon, is whip smart-tight. The music is perfect, underscoring the black humor on display, including an opening tune sung by Louis Armstrong. There are enough laughs to keep things lively, and the supporting cast--espeically Veronica Cartwright as an obnoxious, pushy woman--is right on the money. Contributing to the nasty high jinks here as well are Pruitt Taylor Vince, one of the best unknown American actors around, Seymour Cassel, and Anne DeSalvo.

A real shame this is not on DVD. Add this to the almost unknown group of smart, non-DVD released American neo-noirs which include Mortal Passions, Genuine Risk, Delusion, The Outfit, and Charley Varrick.

Recommended.

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Perhaps this is the best that can be done transferring an old video production to Blu-ray, but the picture and sound quality are no better than can be achieved in a transfer to DVD. The sound is harsh, the picture, while not noisy nor marred by digital artifacts, is soft and the colors are murky. And it's presented in its original, made-for-TV, 1.33:1 ("full-screen") aspect ratio. If you want a copy of this so-so movie, save some money, buy the DVD.

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I really thought this was a wierd movie, but I still liked it. The plot was just a little obvious to me, and the way it ended I was supprised. It just jumped from one thing to another.

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