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All Movie Info
Starring:
Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tom Arnold, Bill Paxton, Tia Carrere, Art Malik, Eliza Dushku, Charlton Heston, Grant Heslov, Gino Salvano, Marshall Manesh, Jane Morris, Katsy Chappell, James Allen, Dieter Rauter, Crystina Wyler, Katsy Chappell, Ofer Samra
Directed By:
James Cameron
Written By:
James Cameron, Claude Zidi, Simon Michaël
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True Lies (1994)
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Movie Review by Jarrod
December 11th, 2007
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'True Lies' proves how good Arnold Schwarzenegger could be as James Bond, with an Austrian accent rather than a British one, and the physique of a body builder, but he is suave and charming, multilingual, a super agent to beat all super agents, proficient with all manner of firearms, a deadly martial artist, and he can pilot high-tech military aircraft. That is Harry Tasker. He has a wife, Helen (Curtis), who thinks he is a computer salesman. She loves him, but finds him boring. They have a rebellious teen daughter, Dana (Eliza Dushku). Harry's current mission puts him in contact with a dangerous terrorist leader named Aziz (Art Malik) and the beautiful art dealer, Juno (Tia carrere), who is working with him, helping him smuggle weapons into the country. Harry keeps his real job a secret from Helen, and she tries to find excitement by meeting a smooth talker named Simon (Bill Paxton), who runs a used car lot, but crafts elaborate lies to seduce and impress gullible women. Simon persuades Helen that he is a government agent. Harry thinks Helen is cheating on him, and decides to confront her and Simon.
Helen is really put through the wringer, subjected to an interrogation by Harry and his partner Gibson (Tom Arnold), which I think is excessive and unnecessary, like the whole suspected adultery business, but it provides a funny character in Simon, who is really a coward, he pees his pants when a gun is pulled on him, and he talks candidly about the disappointing size of his penis, and Paxton makes him very annoying. Funnier, though, is Arnold, who has a surprisingly plump role, and excellent chemistry with Schwarzenegger. One gets the impression that Arnold, when Gibson lectures Harry on the failures of marriage, he is speaking from personal experience. The movie does have a sense of humor, and plenty of audacious and extraordinary action sequences, one of which involves a chase through a lavish hotel, with Harry on horseback, pursuing a guy on a motorcycle. It goes through the lobby, down hallways, up elevators, and onto the roof. Another involves Harry in a jet, trying to rescue Dana as she dangles perilously from a crane arm.
Lots of explosions and improbable stunts, but they are so well-crafted and entertaining, no one is bound to care. That is the gift of James Cameron, to create action scenes of the finest quality. The film even starts off with a solid bang, as Harry infiltrates a private party, much like James Bond to reiterate my earlier point. Jamie Lee Curtis is great, and has a scene where she does a sexy dance, with some clumsy missteps. Nonetheless, she looks fantastic. Yeah, it is overlong, but not painfully so, and chances are, you wouldn't notice it much anyway.
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