Review of Nick of Time (1995) by Allan C — 30 Jul 2015

I remember being very disappointed in this film when it first came out and it unfortunately hasn't improved with age. Johnny Depp and Christoper Walken in an action/suspense flick that takes place in real time sounds like a knockout of a film, but this film is torturously dull and unbelievable.

Depp's daughter is kidnapped by a villainous Walken who blackmails him into assassinating the California state governor. Depp then spend the next 90 minutes trying to save his daughter and trying to get out of killing the governor.

Thown in the usually reliable director John Badham, and this should have been a lock to be a good film. Badham, Depp and Walken all give a good effort, but the script is the main culprit here for the lifeless film.

Once the film gets past the interesting set up, it begins to loose any pretense of credibility. Sure "Die Hard" wasn't a realistic film, but at least characters acted in a logical manner within the context of the film.

This film is very much of it's time, when stories of vast conspiracies were so popular in the 1990s. I think it's the vastness of the conspiracy to kill the governor that the film really started to irritate me.

With that much money and power plotting to kill the governor, their idea to blackmail a random person they pick out in a train station just seems absurd. There is some decent action towards the end, but watching Depp's various attempts to get out of the assassination and rescue his daughter repeatedly being foiled, usually because it then get's revealed that the person he just went to for help is then also in the plot, which seemed to happen over and over and over.

Solid actors Charles S. Dutton, Peter Strauss, Marsha Mason and G.D. Spradlin are all also trapped in this dull film. Overall, the only reason to watch this film is for Christopher Walken as a good villain and the little bit of action at the end.