At a certain point in Malace, I kind of lost faith in the movie. It starts off as one thing and then becomes another by cheating with the plot in a obvious attempt to pull the wool over our eyes. At the beginning, and for a short but involving while, Malice looks like a psycho killer film. then it turns into a rather generic film noir, with all the stereotypes: the high heels, the black mail, the bad girl, and a spectacular fall from a high place in slow motion. The plot gets progressively hard to believe and Nicole Kidman is given more than her acting ability can handle, which becomes a burden on the movie
During the earlier portion of the movie (the better portion) Malice demonstrates on two or even three occasions that Director Harold Becker is more than capable of making his product not just a thriller but a scary movie, the kind that makes the audience jump, but suspense seems to be of little interest in the end.
Malice entertains only on a superficial level. At times it can draw you towards the edge of your seat, but more often it has you sitting back, tired from watching genre clichés play out. What starts off good slowly degrades into a b-movie, a one in a million enterprise which may prove useful only if it is the only movie on the box late at night. It is certainly not unwatchable, it just not all that good.
During the earlier portion of the movie (the better portion) Malice demonstrates on two or even three occasions that Director Harold Becker is more than capable of making his product not just a thriller but a scary movie, the kind that makes the audience jump, but suspense seems to be of little interest in the end.
Malice entertains only on a superficial level. At times it can draw you towards the edge of your seat, but more often it has you sitting back, tired from watching genre clichés play out. What starts off good slowly degrades into a b-movie, a one in a million enterprise which may prove useful only if it is the only movie on the box late at night. It is certainly not unwatchable, it just not all that good.