Fatal Beauty

Rita Rizzoli (Whoopi Goldberg) is going to put the drug king out of business who is producing a deadly drug that's killing people off at an alarming rate. The drug king's top security man, Mike Marshak (Sam Elliott), takes a shine to Rita, although we aren't sure why. I spent the entire film thinking he might be an undercover cop -not so. Had it been any other actor besides Elliott I think this flaw might have prevented the film from being believable. But Elliott, and his cool, understated style just swept me away with his obvious attraction to Rita. There are some very moving moments, some frighteningly real back alley scenes of drug dealings and shootout after shootout. I didn't know what to expect with this film, and was hoping Whoopi would sail with it. She did!

Fatal Beauty has the advantage of allowing Whoopie Goldberg to bounce her keen and cutting wit off Sam Elliott's straight and penetrating gaze. The action is bone-crunching gang-banging blended with South of the Border stylized gun battles, Corporate money, and big drugs.

I particularly like this one for Sam Elliott's prominence. He portrays hired muscle for a corporate big wig, who has no idea what his boss is up to. He also has a hint of a love interest with the star, and I found that delightful. His down to earth personality is perfectly cast, and wittingly executed.

This one always surprises me.

It rates a 7.8/10 on the Buddy Cop Scale from...

the Fiend :.

Director Tom Holland attempts to bring the "Whoopi Goldberg caper comedy" into a new era by adding more serious, dramatic content, drugs and violence. The picture ends up being a murky hybrid of different styles, with Goldberg cast as a cop in Los Angeles tracking down a narcotics ring dealing in killer drugs (isn't that redundant?). Sub-plot romance between Whoopi and fellow cop Sam Elliott never gets off the ground (mainly because Holland keeps most of this story-thread off the screen), while Goldberg tosses in a few sassy asides to reassure us she hasn't become Dirty Harriet. The end result shows definite signs of post-production tinkering, and very little of it is successful. *1/2 from ****

As i see it there are a number of major flaws in this movie. The three major ones are this:

• a movie like dirty harry was reviled by critics who called it fascist (a word they use to describe anything they dislike or politically disagree with) for it's portrayal of police sidestepping or ignoring the constitutional rights of the criminals in the movie. What then are we to make of this movie which features numerous egregious violations of such perceived "rights". Did any critics refer to this as fascist? Don't be silly, of course they didn't. But you can watch this back to back with dirty harry and decide for yourself which of the two skirts the law more.

• the movie hinges on the notion of whoopi goldberg being a highly desirable woman. Even in her thinner youth, i don't think you'd find a man who's first thought about whoopi goldberg would be "attractive"

hence any scenes that require that fall flat and leave the viewer wondering "what universe are these people living in?"

• the tone of the movie is all over the place. On one hand it's trying to cash in on beverly hills cop.... and whoopi never had quite the charisma to substitute for eddie murphy. On the other hand it's trying to be dramatic, but that is undermined by ridiculous and unbelievable stock characters like the angry police captain, the superfluous sidekick, and the evil corporate mastermind. Combine that with the convenient way that every time a character has a chance to finish off whoopi.... they inexplicably hesitate for exaggerated body movements.

A good cast is wasted in what ultimately seems like it was partially rewritten as a star vehicle for whoopi.

A good movie that was overlooked and deserves more recognition. A forgotten movies from the 80's. Especially when it was sandwiched between 2 other Tom Holland movies such as FRIGHT NIGHT and CHILD'S PLAY.