Customer Reviews

True Colors [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I think this is an excellent movie. Good screenplay, good idea, great direction, great acting. John Cusack and James Spader make you believe they are actually best friends, they own their characters and the friendship between their characters.

True Colors stars John Cusack and James Spader as law school buddies on very different career trajectories. Spader plans on going into the Department of Justice and resigns himself to serving the public. Cusack, on the other hand, is an extremely ambitious politician. I bet you can tell where this situation is headed! Despite their differences, they remain friends, even after Cusack steals Spader's girlfriend from him.

The movie tries to examine issues of power and corruption. Unfortunately, the plot is so stale and obvious that it fails to add anything new to this arena. Spader and Cusack are fine, but Imogen Stubbs, as the woman they both love, is terrible. She's a Brit playing an American, but her accent creeps in far too often, which is a huge distraction. I'm a big fan of John Cusack, but this movie is definitely one of his lesser accomplishments.

If you decide to watch "True Colors", I would advise you to watch about the first 30 minutes and then turn it off. The opening of the film is great, and will have you really gripped, but the movie will soon turn very familiar and you'll lose interest. By the end, you will almost laugh at the ridiculous conclusion.

The two main stars are James Spader and John Cusack. They meet the first day of law school at UVA when Cusack smashes into Spader's car on move in day, starting a huge fight between the two. No points for guessing that they will end up roommates. They overcome this tough start and become good friends. Cusack comes from rather humble roots, to say the least, while Spader has a somewhat higher pedigree. In fact, he is dating the daughter (Imogen Stubbs) of a senator (Richard Widmark). It doesn't take long before Cusack is lying left and right about his background, trying to impress everyone. This continues to Capital Hill, when both young men are hired in Washington. Spader is an assistant DA, Cusack works on Widmark's staff.

From here, you can guess what will happen. Knowing that Cusack is such a rotten apple, nothing will be a surprise. He will double cross his "friend" so many times, and in so many cruel ways, that it's implausible that Spader could even stand in the same room with him.

I won't give the story away, but I will say that the end of the movie, when Spader gets his "revenge" is so corny and unbelievable, I would rather have had him pull out a gun and just shoot him. That would have made more sense than this. All in all, the film starts out great and will ultimately leave you cold.

Great movie. The storyline is very interesting and intrigues me every time I watch it. The dvd arrived on time and in good condition.

John Cusack is my daughter's favorite and these got here just in time for her birthday - thank you!

A decent although not perfect yuppie-themed political drama. Good focus on the impact of social & economic status in the arena of government. For those who like John Cusack, see my review(November 13, 2007) of "City Hall."

Right on. Politics and Power. I love this movie. I watch it a lot all the time. John Cusack is really great. Loved it.

A wonderful early 90s film that still holds on to the lure of classic 80s movies. It a pretty good story about two young men and the paths they take out of law school. If your a cusack or james spader fan it is a movie to see. In addition if you ever attended the University of Virginia Law School or as an undergraduate, it is a must see. The first 20 minutes or so of the movie takes place on grounds. You will recognize many places including, the rotunda, mincers, michaels bistro, brown college, the tracks by wild wings and more.

This movie is kind of like "Wall Street" but in a political, Capitol Hill setting as opposed to a stock market, banking setting. I like the concept of two friends starting out at the same time and one turning corrupt to gain votes on Capitol Hill while the other is not interested in power but more in doing the right thing, joining the Justice Department. But I think the performances were not very believable by any of the actors. I dont know if it is his youthful, bratty, baby face demeanor but John Cusack was just not convincing as the corrupt, soul-less and power hungry villain they made him out to be. He totally could not pull that off. I actually had sympathy for him and didn't think he was that bad at all. In fact, he was not doing anything politicians in his place havent been doing for the past 200 years. Politicians need to remain in office and that requires money and the entities with money and lobbyists stationed 24/7 in DC will be the ones influencing representatives, not the common man who elected them. In exchange for their money, therefore, politicians often have to do things that go against the very nature of the democratic process. Now right or wrong, that is unfortunately the reality of the situation and a serious short coming of the system. As Spader said, that is just the nature of the beast. For anyone to think otherwise is naive. So what Cusack was doing wasn't even that outlandish. He just made the mistake of getting caught.

The love story was total bogus too and the chemistry between Spader, Cusack and the female love interest (Imogen Stubbs) was non existent. She was terrible, did not possess an ounce of spark or charm and felt more like a stand in than an actual character one man would betray his best friend for. And he doesnt even love her. In "Legends of the Fall" the love the two brothers had for the female lead was palpable. Here it felt insincere. Also, dont men have this unwritten honor code that you dont mess with your best buddy's girl?

The rise and downfall of Cusack's character, Peter Burton, was also not very convincing. Unlike "Wall Street" where we got to witness quite intricately the rise and then demise of Charlie Sheen's character with all the emotional struggles, ups and downs and changes that come with it on all levels of his life, none of that transformation was visible here. These are supposed be two friends, one of whom climbs the social ladder quite steeply and taps into the power corners of DC while the other remains his innocence and the struggle that ensues. But none of that was visible here or even convincingly played out. In fact, you cannot tell when Burton's rise begins and when it ends.

These are fantastic and quite capable actors so it must be the script and directing as I did not feel that these two truly inhabited their roles and the desired effect (Cusack = villain, Spader = attorney goody shoes, woman = biggest love of their lives) was just not reached. I found Spader's character to lack the kind of luster and ferociousness I know he can bring to his roles, and Cusack seemed more like a misguided, lost college boy with puppy eyes than a ruthless manipulator who gets his way. All these "disconnects" lead to the deliverance of an unconvincing, stale story. While overall I think it is an entertaining movie for a lazy evening of cheesy early 90s movies, I think the writers and director missed the mark on nearly all accounts.

This is supposed to be a political movie about two friends who take different paths and how this affects them. Playing against type, John Cusack is the amoral schemer who starts out lying about his family (he claims to be rich when he's actually working class) and then graduates to letting air out of tires in order to "rescue" senators. James Spader gets to be boring. Sadly the corruption never reaches much above the level of favors and leaked stories concerning Cusack's father-in-law's alzheimers.

This makes for a tedious little morality tale as self-righteous James Spader watches as Cusack steals his girlfriend, manipulates people and finally wins for senate. We don't exactly know his positions on any issues or why he wants to be in public office in the first place. All we know is that he's idealistic enough to mouth off to a senator at the beginning and then getting money from skeezy dudes on yachts in the middle. There's some case where Spader is trying to entrap him, but I don't get it.

There are so many shots of Spader and Cusack looking at each other with an 80s movie saxophone playing that you would be forgiven for thinking that this is a gay romance movie.

The real problem with this movie is the lack of historical perspective. We don't get why anyone wants to vote for Cusack beyond the fact that he might remind them of Lloyd Dobler. Nor do we see why it's a big deal that he's taking kickbacks. This movie was made shortly after the Reagan Revolution complete with Iran-Contra and a very pro-business platform. After this film came out, Bill Clinton would all but brag about his scandals. Yet these fairly tame scandals bring down Cusack and he is supposedly doomed? Hardly. In New York, Charles Rangel just won by a landslide despite being under investigation for such a wealth of malfeasance that one of the first orders of business was to publicly censure him in the House. Over twenty years of flagrant law breaking and he gets a slap on the wrist. Yet Cusack has some unethical meetings with sleazy guys and his career is over?

Not likely.