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30 of 33 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
overlooked little gem, August 2, 2002
As a fan of the writings of Paul Theroux, I try to watch whatever of his works gets filmed. This film has a good story and a good cast but no big Hollywood hype, so it got overlooked. It was refreshing to see Miss Weaver in another role besides co-starring with the Alien monster. I have never seen a bad Michael Caine film; he's one of those actors for whom there are no small parts. As Lord Bulbeck, a semi-aristocratic British politician, he shows a sense of power and responsibility publicly, while he discretely slips into a romance with Sigorney Weaver's character Dr. Lauren Slaughter. She is a modern intellectual PhD working for a London based Middle Eastern think tank, earning so little money she resorts to hooking on the side. But she is funny, charming and practical in her approach. There is some delightful frontal nudity, perhaps her only appearance like this in film. There is intrigue and political perspective revealed through the many characters with diverse nationalities and agendas. This is a small film which shows the tensions and cultural differences between the Arab and British worlds of business and politics that have become even more apparent lately. It should be available on DVD and cable.
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
For Sigourney Weaver & Michael Caine Fans, May 17, 2004
This movie got soundly trashed when it was released in 1986 but I really liked it for a couple reasons. The first, I loved the Paul Theroux book on which it's based. In the book, there are actually two stories. The movie takes its story from "Dr. Slaughter." (The other story, "Doctor DeMarr", is about a twin who foolishly resumes his brother's medical practice after finding him dead from a drug overdose). The second, I had been really wanting to see Sigourney Weaver in a sexy role after battling the ALIEN and evil spirits in GHOSTBUSTERS. (THE YEAR OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY, an excellent film from a few years before with Mel Gibson, was romantic(...)). HALF MOON STREET definitely turned more to the erotic and even scratched the surface of sordid.
That's my only disappointment with the film: the corrosive effects of her double-life are played more situational than emotional. She was smart (...) but the film jumps into suspense and intrigue at the point where she would really have to suffer the inner consequences of her lifestyle. Or lifestyles, as it they were.
Theroux's original story manages to capture it in the final line (not an easy thing to do!). I'd read an interview with Ms. Weaver and she said she'd wished the script had given her character more of a sense of humor. That would've been a great approach! I can see why they'd nix her idea (keep her character SMART!), but she would've come across less smug about being an escort. If you like intrigue with hints of eroticism--and Michael Caine, who's always great--then this movie is worth watching.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not much of interest here, August 21, 2005
Dr. Lauren Slaughter (Sigourney Weaver), an underpaid political analyst, turns to high-end prostitution in order to make ends meet, thereby encountering an influential British politician, Lord Bulbeck (Michael Caine), who is trying to broker a Middle East peace deal. Before long, she is imperiled by an attempt to assassinate Bulbeck and derail the negotiations.
This implausible film doesn't know what it wants to be. Its best moments are the scenes between Weaver and Caine, but unfortunately there's a lot of nonsense to clutter up the plot. Weaver's character is supposed to be intelligent and worldly, yet she hooks under her own name and appears to be surprised later when her unique choice of sideline costs her some credibility in intellectual circles. In addition, it seems unnecessary for the director/writer Bob Swaim and his co-writer Edward Behr to have made her a prostitute at all. Novelist Paul Theroux may have justified it thematically in the original novel, but on the screen it just plays out as a particularly implausible pretext for her to meet Lord Bulbeck. After spending most of the running time developing this relationship, the film concludes with a cliched 15 minutes or so of uninteresting violence, leaving the affair between the two main characters unresolved.
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