MovieChat Forums > Before and After (1996) Discussion > so-so [SPOILERs]

so-so [SPOILERs]

posted 12 years ago by intofilm
2 replies | jump to latest

I never thought I'd think a movie starring Liam Neeson, Meryl Streep, and
alfred Molina was just "so-so" but I sure would never watch this again nor recommend it. They were as good in their roles as the film allowed, but the script was so pedestrian it didn't give them much chance. I thought the boy and his sister seemed to be sleepwalking through most of it, which I would attribute to poor directing.
The only real emotion aroused in me in this rather boring film was dread at the thought of what is going to happen to this soft, pretty, effeminate looking boy once he gets inside Framingham correction facility.
Also, there were so many goofs.I get annoyed with screenwriters like this who have so little respectfor their audience that they write in so much stupid stuff. Granted, I have worked in the public defenders office, but anybody would catch this stuff. Like:
-there is no explanation of how a car that was so hopelessly stuck in the snow that two people couldn't move it is suddenly driven home.
-in a coroner's office, anytime a female's corpse is found alone, no witnesses to the death, there is a test for sexual contact. There is an examination of the vagina and swabs for semen. They would have found she'd had intercourse just before, and would have tested Jacob once he was caught, and that would have been considered important evidence; he might even have been charged with raping her.
-the postcards being delivered by a rural carrier, in a small town where a murder suspect is at large. Here the suspect is sending these postcards addressed to Mom and Dad and signed "J" home, and it's never brought to the attention of the police?? Come On!
-this murder suspect is repeatedly hanging out around Logan Airport, the largest airport near the town where he is an at-large murder suspect, and there has been no police attempt to circulate his picture to security officers at the airport??
-a good police investigation wouldn't just impound the car. The police detective is already suspicious the dad is going to destroy evidence. They would search the whole garage. They would see there was a stove there, and would see if it had just been burning, and make a note of that. They would notice that the shiny new jack in the trunk didn't go with that car, and find the other one in the garge. Even though he had quickly rinsed it,they would have been able to find enough blood remnant in the sensitive lab tests they do now. Even a little molecule of blood is enough.
-a criminal lawyer with this kind of prestigious standing, on finding out that the clients had lied to him the whole time, witholding crucial evidence necessary to the conduct of his case, would quit. He says he didn't because he was "defending Jacob" but that just wouldn't happen. Jacob and the parents had broken trust with him. Criminal lawyers approach to their clients is 'you absolutely must level with me. I can't defend you effectively without getting the truth from you.' If he's only lost one case in his life, he's not going to jeopardize his standing in this kind of a mess.

[–] TrentinaNE 12 years ago

I finally saw this movie on TV recently. You're so right: little of it makes any sense, and there's not enough emotional heft to make one overlook the logical failings.

Still puzzling over why Meryl Streep took this tepid role.

[–] Molly-31 10 years ago

the postcards being delivered by a rural carrier, in a small town where a murder suspect is at large. Here the suspect is sending these postcards addressed to Mom and Dad and signed "J" home, and it's never brought to the attention of the police?? Come On!

I spent ten years in a small town. Believe me, this comment is absolutely dead center.

Quite normal for postal workers to steam letters open and read them -- one reason little girls used wax seals or stickers on pen pal letters in my day (mid-1960s). Harder to get them open without breaking the seal. No mailman is going to deliver any postcards without reading them. And this is under normal circumstances, not counting the fact that these are the parents of a boy whom everyone has already decided is a murderer, and his mother is the town doctor. Every tiny detail of any kind of information on the parents, the sister and the boy would be examined and scrutinized ad infinitum in cafes, beauty parlors and barber shops. Hearsay would be repeated as fact and vice versa.

This was why I believed the mother when she said "this isn't him, someone made him write that." He's lived in that town for that long, he knows there'll be fifty sets of fingerprints all over that postcard before his parents ever see it. At the very least it was written for public consumption to throw people off his trail. I thought it was going to be a completely different story from what it turned out.

You've got me?! Who's got you?!