NICK OF TIME. Directed by John Badham; written by Patrick Sheane Duncan; produced by John Badham for Paramount. Starring Johnny Depp and Christonher Walken. Rated R.
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Edward Scissorhands as The Man Who Knew Too Much? Well... it sort of works, part of the time. If you can let yourself be really gullible and swallow a pretty preposterous plot.
Nick of Time puts an ordinary person in extraordinary circumstances, the way Hitchcock liked to do. Not that Nick is quite in the class of North by Northwest.
Depp, believe it or not, is the ordinary person, not the kind of role he's used to playing. And, unfortunately, the moviemakers overcompensated, possibly trying to paper over his reputation for eccentric characters. They made him a bit TOO ordinary. His fans probably won't care, but I like him with little more color and charisma.
And the situation he's dropped into is a bit TOO extraordinary. Intriguing, yes, but ultimately pretty ridiculous. Watson (Depp) and his young daughter are kidnapped upon arrival in L.A. by a sinister pair (Walker and Roma Maffia) pretending to be cops. What they really are is imaginative hitpersons who want Depp to kill someone for them. If he doesn't, they'll kill his daughter.
Their plot has a kind of insane logic to it; if everything worked out the way they planned, their target would be eliminated with no blame affixed to them. Watson would probably be killed in the melee, and no one would be the wiser.
Depp and Walken do a good enough job with the story that not ALL of its holes and logical reaches are immediately apparent, good enough that it makes a fair-to-middling suspense yarn. Walken, in particular, is scarily convincing. And they're aided by a capable supporting cast of mostly creepy types who are in on the plot, along with a few good souls who are not.
When the smoke clears, however, the pail just won't hold water, to mix metaphors rather haphazardly. Even without an ever-expanding conspiracy reaching even to the target's husband. The time limit they give Nick, for one thing, is obviously just a gimmick. And what makes these thugs think Watson won't just fall apart and start shooting everyone in sight? That's how I'd probably react to the situation. Or maybe just faint, or throw up?
Rent one of those Hitchcock movies if you want to see how this sort of thing should be done. And hope Depp gets back to what he does best for his next movie.
December 13, 1995