DON'T SAY A WORD turned out to be much better than I was expecting. Michael Douglas was great as a man racing against time to unlock the mystery surrounding a young patient in order to get his kidnapped daughter back. Director Gary Fleder creates a suitably rainy, dreary atmosphere for the film and gives the big city of New York a strange sense of claustrophobia. Sean Bean heads the bad guys in his usual villainous manner, Famke Janssen is good but rather wasted as Douglas' bed-ridden wife, and Britany Murphy is a standout as the girl who isn't as troubled as she leads people to believe. Murphy is definitely one of the few teen actors in Hollywood with any talent, and her performance here is excellent. Jennifer Esposito is good as a cop involved with a double murder that ultimately develops a connection to the main story, though we never learn much about her character other than the fact she wants to get things solved. Perhaps there were already enough characters to work with. Oliver Platt rounds out the cast as a colleague of Douglas' who always seems to be hiding more than he's telling.
For a film that runs nearly two hours, it flies by rather quickly, with a lot of suspense and good performances from everyone involved, all leading up to a tense climax on an East River island that looks like it came from an old Hammer horror film. My only complaint is that, after this big build up for almost two hours that we know Douglas and Bean are ultimately going to go at it, the demise (and I think it's giving nothing away to say the villain gets his at the end) of Bean's character was rather lackluster.
But otherwise, it's a solid thriller that delivers a good deal of suspense, excellent performances, and an intriguing story.
For a film that runs nearly two hours, it flies by rather quickly, with a lot of suspense and good performances from everyone involved, all leading up to a tense climax on an East River island that looks like it came from an old Hammer horror film. My only complaint is that, after this big build up for almost two hours that we know Douglas and Bean are ultimately going to go at it, the demise (and I think it's giving nothing away to say the villain gets his at the end) of Bean's character was rather lackluster.
But otherwise, it's a solid thriller that delivers a good deal of suspense, excellent performances, and an intriguing story.