"Desperate Measures," the latest release from TriStar Pictures and director Barbet Schroeder ("Reversal of Fortune," "Kiss of Death"), is also a good description of the steps taken by the film in an attempt to please the audience. Although it has an intriguing premise and features a fine performance from Keaton, the film eventually trips over itself and falls flat as it tries to be a topnotch thriller.
The beginning, however, does indeed look promising as the setup immediately draws our interest. We have a cop who needs a murderous sociopath's bone marrow for his sick son. Then there's the convict who sees this as his best chance for escape, and once he does, finds that the cop won't let him get killed. It's quite the quandary, and on paper it sound great -- and even on film it's a captivating start. On one hand we have the dad who's genuinely concerned about his precious son, while on the other we have the convict who we know has some devious plan up his shackled sleeve. In fact, his escape plan is one of those that can only come from a screenwriter's brainstorming mind, and it's one of those that the audience always loves because it just seems so ingenious.
So, you may ask, where does the story go wrong? Well, the biggest problem is that it simply has no where to go. Sure, screenwriter David Klass ("Kiss the Girls") delivers some chase scenes and suspenseful moments as the characters scurry from room to room and building to building, but there's never any doubt about how the story will end. You don't really think they'd let the nine- year-old die, do you? If they did, the audience would feel betrayed that they expended some concern about everything turning out okay. In addition, the story would end on a down note as the kid and the convict would both be dead and the cop would be terribly depressed. Likewise and directly related, you know that McCabe won't be shot and killed for the same reason -- if he dies his bone marrow is useless, the boy then dies, and we're back to the previous situation.
Thus, what we're left with is a series of scenes where people threaten to shoot McCabe, but Conner won't let them. He has to figure out a creative and successful way to capture the convict and keep him alive. The problem is, he never does that. He does chase him all around the hospital and later outside it, but he never takes proactive steps in solving his dilemma. He reacts instead of acts, and that prevents the audience from totally getting behind his character.
The other -- and bigger -- problem directly related to that is Garcia playing the cop in a very flat manner. While we understand he's all business because he's trying to save his son's life, he's playing this guy just like Jean-Claude Van Damme would: He either looks concerned or yells at others, but not much else. We can sympathize with his plight, but the fact that for the most part he's a one note character, we don't really have any reason to like him (beyond the obvious) and thus don't really root for his success.
Somewhat by default then -- but also due to a stellar performance -- the audience turns its support to favor Michael Keaton's character. Playing one of the more richly created sociopath villains to come down the looney bin pike since Hannibal Lecter ("Silence Of The Lambs"), Keaton creates a guy who's "fun" to watch. It's not that we really want him to succeed, or that we support his actions, but he's so charismatic -- especially compared to Garcia's character -- that you can't help but secretly like the bad guy. Of course that may just be director Schroeder's plan -- to turn Garcia into something of a villain while making Keaton more sympathetic. Planned or not, that's the way it turns out.
The former Mr. Mom and Batman has always had a darker side lying just beneath the surface of most of his characters, and roles such as in "Pacific Heights" highlighted that. But even in his comedies, that characteristic was there and that's why Keaton's brooding take on Batman was, and still is, the best of the series. His take here on McCabe is simultaneously chilling and entertaining, but unfortunately that character, like the others, finds himself stuck in a plot that eventually just ends up spinning its wheels.
The rest of the performances are standard issue, nondescript parts and feature the stereotypical partner, police chief, concerned doctor and other such characters. The performers are okay, but easily could have been replaced by anyone without having any noticeable effect. Relative newcomer Joseph Cross -- as the nine-year-old leukemia victim -- does an okay job. At times, however, he's saddled with having to deliver lines of dialogue or bits of acting that are either written way too old for his age and/or are manipulatively unbelievable. Many are obviously intended to pull at the audience's heartstrings, but their obviousness undermines the effect.
There's also the point that we often see the reportedly gravely sick boy up and running about (particularly near the end), which lessens our concern about his health. That's not the only problem. Others include most of the other police officers and superiors who too quickly question Conner and then turn on him. It's use as a plot device is also too obvious (an obstacle for his character) and needs better reasons to be successfully credible. Making him a "fugitive" is a smart move, it's just too bad that they didn't utilize that element very well.
That, of course, also directly ties in with the fact that Conner's actions result in many people being threatened, wounded, and killed. Not only does that make him less heroic in our eyes, but it should also cause the other cops to really want to get him just as much as they want to get McCabe. There are a few brief moments of that, but not enough to make it highly effective.
Then there's the question of why Conner just doesn't shoot and wound McCabe so that he can apprehend him, and still keep him alive for the bone marrow extraction. Perhaps if McCabe had kept a hostage at knife or gunpoint or deployed a backup plan -- a booby trap or timed explosive that only he could deactivate -- then we'd understand Conner's reluctance to shoot him. But when the two come face to face out in the open where Conner could simply shoot him in the leg to slow him down and capture him, he doesn't do it.
Other minor points also undermine the film's efforts. One concerns McCabe being able to pull up plans on the prison computer for the hospital's blueprints, ventilation layout, etc... That such information (when part of the building is used as a prison itself) would be available over the computer/Internet is ludicrous. The worst part, though, is that the prison officials, or even Conner himself, would allow McCabe to have access to the computer (and those plans) knowing full well that's where he's being taken. Since Conner also initially studies the plans to look for possible escape routes, one would imagine he'd be smart enough to consider the convict having access to them as well. Such moments could easily have been worked around (McCabe getting someone else to bring him the information), but they come off so blatantly bad that they're an insult to the average moviegoer.
Beyond all of those problems, the film then turns into nothing more than your run of the mill, extended chase sequence that's only moderately successful at being thrilling or even engaging. When the chase finally makes it out of the hospital and onto the streets of San Francisco, the big car chase follows (with cars flying in slow motion -- but fortunately nothing involving the famous hilly streets). Once this happens -- something I assumed and hoped had all but vanished from the big screen after decades of use -- you know that the film and the film makers have collectively run out of creative gas (especially when compared with far superior cop chasing convict movies such as "Face/Off").
Despite Keaton's inspired performance and the initially intriguing premise, we can't recommend the film. Moviegoers who don't see many releases may find some of the action/chase scenes as suspenseful. Nearly everyone else, however, will find most of it repetitively trite and marginally passable as a "fun time" at the movies. For all of the above reasons, we give "Desperate Measures" just a 3 out of 10.
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