Ricochet

Sick, sick, sick, sick, sick. And what's not sick is out-and-out preposterous. It's hard to understand exactly what possessed the principals involved to make this movie. Washington, you've got to figure, wanted a down and dirty action picture to sandwich in between his 1990 Oscar win (Glory) and his forthcoming Malcolm X turn for Spike Lee. And Lithgow, perhaps weary of the critical acclaim that greets every role he plays, decided to go ballistic and play this one-dimensional, three-named psycho killer Earl Talbot Blake. Washington plays a rookie cop, Nick Styles, who outwits Blake during a robbery. The publicity surrounding Blake's arrest launches Styles' career. He rises to become a very high-profile Los Angeles assistant district attorney with aspirations of higher political office. Blake's sole reason for living is his psychopathic devotion to exacting revenge from Styles. He escapes from prison in a shockingly violent manner and masterminds the appearance of his own death. Thus, while no one is looking for the presumed-dead Blake, the psychopath sets out to destroy Styles' life. And this he does, bit by bit, by subjecting Styles to a continuing series of public humiliations and private tortures that make it seem like Styles is losing his mind -- big time. It all climaxes in an outrageous man-to-man combat sequence atop downtown Los Angeles' landmark welded steel-spired structure, the Twin Towers. It's staged like something straight out of King Kong with the look of an old 1930s Universal horror movie where the lightning flashes strobe across the undulating coils of tubing in the mad scientist's laboratory. There's a lot of really ugly violence in Ricochet, the kind of images and thoughts that just make you feel scummy to be involved with, no matter how passively. Ice T be cool, though he seems to have dropped in from some other movie. An ill-developed sub-plot has him play a childhood friend/grown-up drug kingpin who helps Styles when the police can't. There's not a whole lot of logic or depth to the role, but that could also describe virtually every character in this movie. Director Mulcahy (Razorback, Highlander and dozens of award-winning music videos and commercials) describes Ricochet as an “anti-buddy movie.” It might be better described as a Joel Silver movie, a producer who is making a career out of his “can't touch this” action style (Die Hard 1 & 2, Lethal Weapon 1 & 2, Predator, 48 HRS., Commando). Ricochet is truly hit or miss.