Most people probably didn't get the symbolic message.When the lawyer pays his visits to whores, he hands them over the envelope full of cash.When from (a supposed morally clean) Prosecutor he evolves to senator, he gets an envelope full of cash, by his clients...Get It? Who are the whores? That's what the movie is about.Hypocrisy from everybody involved. Great movie!
... View MoreHave a hankering for those 1990s sex thrillers involving powerful people drawn into sordid, beautifully-lit clinches that threaten to tear apart their career and their family? Welcome to Reckless, which has been blandly renamed from "Zipper" in the US. This straight-to-DVD thriller – partly based on the exploits of governor Eliot Spitzer in 2008 – has an intriguing setup which grows increasingly tiresome as the story wears on. Patrick Wilson, who has the greatest fake smile in the business, plays ambitious state prosecutor Sam, and he has his eyes on congress. Unfortunately he also has his eyes on the ladies, and he's willing to risk his marriage to the suspecting Jeannie (Lena Headey) in order to get his end away with a series of escort girls. Meanwhile George (Richard Dreyfuss) is grooming him for life at the top (and life under the microscope), while a wily journalist (Ray Winstone) rifles through his private life. The drama lies in Sam's face as all these pressures – which exist in a highly competitive and masculine world – bear down upon him. Boo hoo, you might say, and you'd kind of be right. While Wilson is talented and nuanced enough to help us relate to this reprehensible talisman of white male privilege, the film itself seems unsure of where its sympathies lie, or indeed what the story is really about. Ostensibly it's interested in the fallout of adultery and the radiation of guilt, but it never goes deep and it's strangely boring. The meaning of fidelity in the modern world has been intelligently explored in some great movies, from Eyes Wide Shut to Gone Girl, but Reckless comes across as mimicry, resembling its peers only in the most superficial ways. The neorealist aesthetic, with its ridiculous saturated colouration, resembles David Fincher or Steven Soderbergh, but the dramatic content only matches the latter at his most indulgent. The serial killer score adds to the tabloid self-importance of it all. The problem with this sub-genre is so often that it suffers from a lack of awareness of its own absurdity. More than once we get a risible speech suggesting that really all human beings are like this, deep down, and that the only difference is that those in the public eye are unfairly held to a higher standard. Never do we get the counterargument: that Sam and his ilk behave this way out of some other impotence, or that their lust for power and sex are two sides of the same character trait. Wilson carries the film, and he's supported by a very fine cast. Headey is solid in the role of Sam's formidable wife, while a miscast Winstone makes the most of a slightly thankless supporting role. Then there's Dreyfuss, who appears to be acting in a movie far smarter than the one we're actually watching. Also, John Cho needs to be in more films. But none of the cast can elevate such hackneyed material. Shoot it however stylishly you want – there's no escaping the clichés of punched steering wheels, illicit phone calls watched from windows, and dead-eyed faces sinking in baths. It's a film to be found when flicking channels, and one to be forgotten within seconds of flicking again.
... View MoreThis film tells the story of a married lawyer with a promising political career, who gets side tracked by experiences with ladies from an escort agency."Zipper" keeps me engaged because the I like the story. The first half is more erotic while the second half is more of a thriller. How Patrick Wilson does a good job portraying his character, who lets his urges overtake his sensibility. His guilt in the diner with the reporter is piercingly good. I think the story is well presented, easy to follow and engaging. The scenes are nicely shot as well. I enjoyed watching "Zipper"!
... View More7.25 of 10. A solid R-rated political drama/thriller, with a twisted tragic/happy ending, figuratively and literally.How does a well-informed government attorney familiar with the ways powerful people get caught and tracked in various levels of crimes get caught having illegal sex? Herein lies one way that doesn't involve any hacking or computer errors. It also provides an unexpected way out.A few downsides like it doesn't make the location very clear, which is important when doing political stories with a close connection to reality, only briefly near the beginning indicating it's South Carolina. The rest of the way it could be any US urban/suburban area. They also opted to rarely use regional accents. And finally there's the bad product placement issues. None of it enough to stop the film from being worth watching, but it does stand in the way of something worthy of awards.
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