"The Net" is a GREAT movie to say the least! The majority of the best suspense movies are built around a story having to do with a kidnapping, murder, or something else like that. The makers of this movie did a spectacular job of making "The Net" intriguing, compelling, interesting, and best of all, suspenseful. Sandra Bullock also puts on an unforgettable performance that makes the movie believable and even more compelling.

An identity can be stolen and a life can be changed dramatically by a simple computer hacker or even a simple diskette. Whether you're a fan of the internet, things having to do with computers or not, at least give "The Net" a rent. If you're a big fan of movies that keep you on the edge of your seat, don't even think about renting "The Net", BUY it instead!

The premise is that an isolated, but brilliant, software engineer (Angela Bennett played by Sandra Bullock) has her identity stolen, when she stumbles across a conspiracy involving trap doors in a software security system used by many federal, state, and private databases.

Although stolen identities are a hot topic in today's issues, the ability to steal someone's identity is proportional to the how isolated an individual may be, and this theft is made easier because Angela's life is very isolated. She works out of her home and communicates primarily over the telephone and internet. There are lots of people who would like to meet her, but she puts them off.

The technological portion of the film that is interesting shows how a person, who depends on computerized output, can be murdered when someone else fools with the data bases. This happens over and over, as the conspiracy attempts to isolate and kill Angela.

The action part of this film involves most of the cliches common to this type of genre. We get the chase in the crowd, on the merry-go-round, in the darken street (several times), on the freeway, at the bridge crossing, on the boat, in the amusement park, and finally on the catwalk. The first couple of times are OK, but after a while it begins to get tired.

Fortunately the film is saved because it reverses the usual gender roles. Like true action heros, no one suddenly appears and SAVES Angela. Everyone she tries to get help from are either killed or isolated. In the end Angela saves herself using the same wits and knowledge that made her a much sought after engineer. She gets back her identity, exposes the conspiracy, and kills the bad guy.

I like Sandra Bullock. She has the isolated awkward character down pat, but still with enough pluck to fight back. Jeremy Northam's heavy is smooth enough to stare down a cobra, and seems to have a psychopathic personality that he trieds to hold in check. He gets his relief on a keyboard.

I wanted to scream at some of the technology holes in this film. The flashing terminal showing lots of overlaying screens which, I suppose, was suppose to represent the Trap Door was laughable. The way in which Angela tricks Jack into infecting the main system with a virus on the floppy without getting him to explicitly invoke the virus program is, well, not very realistic. One of my favorites was the ability for Angela to easily read binary code, and in a matter of seconds, identify and isolate an absolutely new virus. This is indeed a superwoman. There were lots of other things too, but they would only be distractions to people who actually make their living writing software.

I recommend this film.