Review of The Rainmaker (1997) by Karen O — 08 Mar 2015

On paper, The Rainmaker comes across as a wonderfully tense drama about a law graduate fighting against an insurance company, who are being sued by the parents of a young adult, who recently died of cancer.

When the insurance company doesn't pay his medical bills. You have a director who, during his peak, was a master at creating tension, crafting huge but palletable story lines and a visual auteur. Equally you also boast a monolithic cast, especially for the time.

So how can The Rainmaker possibly go wrong? Well expectation does play a huge part but the reality is, this drama is anything but. Very few moments are tense or engrossing, actors are either forced or pushed to over act in the worst possible way and at points the entire thing feels so self aware that you can literally feel characters breaking the 4th wall, unintentionally of course.

This film comes off as laughable at points and not in a good way, it almost falls into the category of one of the niche 90's films and it suffers so much because of this. First of all the writing is basic, the plot plods along with simple situations, simple solutions and woeful stereotypes.

The dialogue in parts is mediocre at best, were it not for the expertly tuned cast behind the reigns, this would be unsalvagable drivel. The look of the film is, I suppose to give it credit, fitting, however you dont really feel to alive in the world being portrayed.

Yes it looks the part but it feels like it was filmed off the back of another Hollywood set, there are no stand out visuals, nothing even resembling Coppola's visual eye. In fact you'd be shocked he actually directed it had Bram Stokers Dracula not been around just prior to this and even that film felt a lot more invigorating than this.

As I mentioned the cast are wonderful, Jon Voight, Matt Damon, Danny Glover, Dani De Vito, Claire Danes, Dean Stockwell and even Mickey Rourke but as we all know having some serious talent can only get you so far, Damon stands out as him and Danes are the only ones who appear to be taking this film in a serious direction and even at times, that is ropey.

Rourke is just there for the paycheck, Voight is straight out of mellow drama classes, Stockwell gets minutes of screen time. Leaving De Vito and Glover as a form of lovable duo who brighten the whole thing up form time to time.

It's not all bad, as I said the cast do with what they have and although there is nothing stellar at play here it is entirely watchable. Luckily the movie is also paced decently as well, it could have done with a little less focus on some elements or examined them in more detail, as the film has a tendency to create situations, only to debunk them in the click of a finger, however I can understand how in the edit Coppola may have changed the tone after seeing the dailies and chopped a lot out to make it fit into this hokey drama that pokes fun more than it should.

An area I would however love to commend for nailing it was the score, the music is wonderfully fitting and instantly screams American court drama. Apart from a selection of gripping moments dotted around the place, a power house cast and a passable experience, The Rainmaker just feels like one massive missed opportunity.

If it wanted to be a tense and emotive piece, dropping the hum drum mellow drama and examining some of the grittier elements would have been vital, equally if it were wanting to stay light hearted, not that the source material resonates well with that, it should have done so with more sincerity and lack of cheap stupidity to get laughs.