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Night Visions
Chameleon Blue
USA 1990
produced by Thomas Baum, Marianne Maddalena, Rick Nathanson, Wes Craven (executive) for MGM/NBC
directed by Wes Craven
starring James Remar, Loryn Locklin, Penny Johnson, Francis X.McCarthy, Mitch Pileggi, Jon Tenney, Mruce MacVittie, Angela Alvarado, Daniel Beer, Kristen Corbett, Jesscia Craven, Ron Howard George, Timothy Leary, John Benjamin Martin, Roxanna Michaels, Eric Rosser, Michele Roth, Dendrie Taylor, Bruce Wagner
written by Wes Craven, Thomas Baum, music by Brad Fiedel
review by Mike Haberfelner
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If tough, alcoholic and divorced cop Mackey (James Remar) wants to
remain on the case of the Spread Eagle Killer, he has to team up
with Sally Powers (Loryn Locklin), a college graduate without experience. However, it soon becomes apparent that
there's more to Sally than just a college degree - and the memory of her
parents slaughtered by a serialkiller: She also seems to be a
schizophrenic, who frequently slips into other identities (including an
aerobic instructor and a biker babe) and inexplicably always pops up at
the crime scenes ... so much so that Mackey temporarily suspects her,
actually. Eventually, Mackey is taken off the case after all, while his
superior (Mitch Pileggi) plans to use Sally's abilities to track down the
killer and thus figures it would be a good idea to use her as bait ...
however, what nobody (but the audience) has suspected thus far is that the
killer actually is within the police force, none other than young and handsome
photographer Martin (Jon Tenney), who has been dating Sally for a while
now, and who is now able to snatch her from underneath
her watchdogs' eyes. Why? Because he wants to create the perfect
patchwork body out of photographs of his victims ... Fortunately,
Mackey, despite being off the case, has not forgotten his partner and
comes to her rescue just in time, and in the finale, Martin is allowed to fall from a
rooftop to his death. During his long career, director Wes
Craven has directed several genre classics ... and a lot of duds. And
while the made-for-television Night Visions (which was probably
intended as a pilot) is at least competently made, it definitely belongs
into the latter category: The script is horribly far-fetched and
over-constructed, so much so that several plot elements just refuse to
make sense any which way you look at them. Also, the solution of the
whodunnit-aspects of the story is totally predictable while the finale
with both Sally and the killer hanging from a rooftop is way too clichéd
to be exciting. And then there are the flashbacks to Sally running from
the killer who has slaughtered her family which are almost comical. Add
to this a totally unimpressive deer-in-headlight performance by
Loryn Locklin and James Remar trying way too hard to come off as the tough
guy with a heart of gold, and you are left with - maybe not a total
failure compared to other US-American TV-movies, but not a film Wes Craven
can be proud of either ...
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