Thursday is one of the great forgotten neo-noir comedies of the 90's, floating on the wake of everything from Tarantino to Verhoeven. It's almost impossible to find these days (I watched an old youtube version years ago), but worth hunting down for its vehement hedonism, mean spirited dark humour and cast members who take a walk down the dark end of the street, and clearly have fun with the shamelessly disgusting material. There's a spirited willingness to be nasty, a bottom feeding urban sleaziness that almost reminded me of Wayne Kramer's Running Scared, or Joe Carnahan's Stretch. Thomas Jane, riding the wave of a supporting role in Face/Off, plays Casey, an ex drug dealer trying to go straight and adopt a child with his wife (Paula Mitchell). Suddenly his old buddy Nick (a ferocious Aaron Eckhart) blows back into his life with big ideas and an even bigger amount of heroin he stole from god knows where. This sets off a wild and exceedingly weird chain of events including convenience store robbery, murder, a psycho named Billy (James LeGros) with a penchant for elaborate torture, a kinky femme fatale (Paulina Porizkova) and a scary rogue cop (Mickey Rourke). It's a big bloody hot mess, but a brilliant one that nails the feverish tone of stuff like Natural Born Killers, a complete disregard for discretion or moderation, tossing everyone and everything into the fire until the audience feels like they need a big collective shower. Eckhart is a treat to watch, taunting the laid back Jane with a knowing glee, waiting for that inevitable revert to bis old, crazy self. Rourke is relegated to what is essentially an extended cameo, but he makes the most of it with quiet tension and the menace of a junkyard dog. This film has what is probably the weirdest sex scene I've seen, which the youtube version won't show (being the sicko that I am, I had to track it down elsewhere). Brutally reckless stuff, and a howl if this is your type of thing. Watch for a brief and hilarious cameo from Michael Jeter.

So-so. Clearly an attempt to plagiarise the Quentin Tarantino style of film- making, especially the swagger and dialogue. However, mostly just comes off as a lame imitation. Some scenes and actions seem lifted straight out of Tarantino movies.Part of the problem lies in the casting. Thomas Jane and Aaron Eckhart don't have the swagger and delivery necessary for a Tarantinoesque role. Or maybe it is just the fact that writer-director Skip Woods is no Quentin Tarantino.

A former L.A. drug dealer has moved to Houston to make a new life for himself as a married architect. Everything falls apart when he is suddenly visited by one of his former cohorts who comes carrying heroin.I notice that other reviewers have compared this film to the early work of Tarantino -- and I can see that with some of the dialogue, the mysterious case, the violence... but if this is like Tarantino, it is a paler shade of Tarantino. Still good, mind you, but not quite on his level.What would have been nice would be more Mickey Rourke. Aaron Eckhart is great (and this may be before he got big), but Rourke is a true master in his roles. Oh well.

This movie is excellent. Not because it does anything special or new, but because it is consistently great in all of its parts. No part stands out as being "ground-breaking" or "stellar", but all parts are far above mediocre, and that makes, to me, an excellent movie.I own several copies of this movie, and may acquire it on collectors DVD or Blu-Ray, someday (holding off right now due to high blu-ray prices, and of course the face that I don't have a blu-ray player... but that's beside the point of this review).It stars off sort of ordinary, but quickly turns into a drama filled with tension, some action, strongly portrayed characters, and a well though out plot which keeps you interested until the very end.Wait, no, it does NOT start out ordinary.It starts out sort of like what a Qun. Tar. movie WISHES it could be. With an awesome scene where an attempt to buy coffee and a donuts goes... very, very wrong.By the end of the movie, nothing was as it seemed, and a few people are dead, and a few people are very rich. I won't tell you who... watch and enjoy! Overall rating: 10/10, A**, Excellent!