I love this movie so much

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Tim Whalen (Rob Lowe) is a yachting stud having an affair with his boss's wife Brooke (Kim Cattrall). They live in the upscale town of Southampton, Long Island. Olivia Lawrence (Meg Tilly) is a young heiress after her mother's death. She returns home after college and gets involved with Tim. She is forced to live with her alcoholic gambling debt-ridden stepfather Tony Gateworth (John Glover), and his girlfriend Anne Briscoe (Dana Delany). On the surface, Tim and Tony don't get along but they actually have a scheme to kill Olivia. Tim starts to have cold feet but Tony threatens him. In the planned break-in, Tim kills Tony and Olivia insists on taking the blame as self-defense. Her love-lore friend Officer Mike McGill (Doug Savant) turns a blind eye to incriminating evidence.It's a twisty murder scheme conspiracy. The movie suffers as one thinks about it too much. It's highly questionable why Tim does any of it. How could he ever guarantee he'd be paid in the original plan? I buy into Meg Tilly's cluelessness. She's probably the only one that makes sense. The various wills and legality need to be better explained. Also the schemes seem to be so many excuses to advance the plot. My biggest problem is that the movie tries too hard to overload the overwrought melodrama. It becomes too cloying and tiresome. And that music just won't stop.

Pretty film about some scam-artists who try to get their carefully chosen gigolo to marry into money.Rob Lowe has never looked more handsome in the role of a Lothario while the part of the rich chick is played by beautiful Meg Tilly. The story isn't bad and Bob Swaim's precise direction creates suspense to keep things on a sharp edge. The movie is further enhanced by David Watkin's gorgeous cinematography of Hampton Island, John Barry's mellifluous music, and John Kasarda's lavish production design.Interesting from start to finish with some especially poignant twists along the way.

"Masquerade" is a crime thriller set among the wealthy inhabitants of the Hamptons, a socially exclusive part of Long Island. The main character is Olivia Lawrence, a young heiress who has been left tremendously wealthy by the recent death of her mother. (Olivia's father has died several years earlier). Olivia forms a relationship with Tim Whalen, a yacht skipper, but this causes friction with her stepfather Tony Gateworth, who suspects that Tim is only interested in Olivia for her wealth. There may be something in his suspicions, as Tim is also carrying on with attractive older woman Brooke, his employer's wife. Gateworth's objections to Tim, however, seem hypocritical, as it is obvious that he only married Olivia's mother for her money and has lost no time since her death in moving his new mistress, Anne, into the family mansion.The title is significant. "Masquerade" is the name of Olivia's yacht, but the word "masquerade", literally a masked ball, can also signify a charade or pretence, and several of the characters are pretending to be something they are not, pretences which are revealed in a series of twists. Tim and Gateworth seem to hate one another, but it is suddenly revealed that they are plotting together to murder Olivia for her money. During a confrontation between Gateworth, Tim and Olivia, however, Gateworth is killed when his pistol goes off during a struggle with Tim. Officer McGill, a local cop and former boyfriend of Olivia, is put in charge of the investigation into Gateworth's death.There are no really outstanding acting performances in this film, but Meg Tilly makes a convincingly innocent Olivia, even though at 28 she was several years older than her character. Rob Lowe does enough to show that he was more than just a Brat Pack pretty-boy, even though he shows enough flesh to keep his most ardent female fans happy. (Tim is supposed to be older than Olivia, but in reality Lowe was four years younger than Tilly). There are certain similarities between this film and "Wild Things", a thriller from 1998, which also has a plot involving yachting and differences in social class. (That film, however, was set in Florida rather than Long Island). "Masquerade", however, is by far the better of the two films, and part of the reason, I think, lies in the way in which the thriller genre developed over the intervening ten years. Although the plot of "Masquerade" contains several twists (there are a couple more after those mentioned above), it always remains perfectly comprehensible. By 1998, however, there was a tendency (one which has continued into the twenty-first century) for the scriptwriters of films like these to demonstrate their cleverness by devising excessively complicated plots; that of "Wild Things" contains so many twists that it ends up twisted out of all recognition, and almost totally incomprehensible to the average viewer, even with the assistance of a series of flashbacks interspersed with the closing credits and intended to make good all the numerous plot holes in the actual movie. Pauline Kael described "Masquerade" as a "tranquil and sophisticated thriller". "Tranquil" may seem an odd choice of adjective to describe a thriller, especially one in which several characters meet violent deaths, yet I know what she meant. "Masquerade" lacks not only the silly-cleverness that mars films like "Wild Things", it also lacks the cynical amorality that is their stock-in-trade. Towards the end I was waiting for some truly devastating silly-clever twist, like Olivia 's mother and Gateworth both coming back from the dead, or Olivia turning out to have planned the whole thing with her lesbian lover Brooke. Yet nothing like this happens. The twist is that there is no twist. There is no assumption that an obviously innocent person must be guilty; Olivia turns out to be just as sweet and naïve as she has always seemed. Moreover, Tim, whatever his original motives may have been, turns out to have genuinely fallen in love with her and selflessly sacrifices his own life while saving hers. It comes as quite a surprise to come across a thriller that does not take a completely cynical view of human nature. 7/10

Ok.. This movie stars Rob Lowe(The West Wing), Meg(whatever happened to) Tilly, John Glover( in his A**hole role that he always does well but looks creepy and Doug Savant ( which is best known as the gay guy off of Melrose Place. I remember watching this movie back when it first came out and decided to rent it again after all those years. The Guy who wrote this movie, Dick Wolf is a great writer and he must have been testing out his sea legs with this trash. Meg Tilly acts and sounds like she's on drugs, Rob Lowe acts devilish along with John Glover who by the way looks like his hairstylist had a little too much fun with his hair and Doug Savant APPEARS to be the nice guy.*****SPOILER ALERT********************* Rich Girl graduates college, Rich Girl comes home gets a wonderful greetings from her Cop Friend and her horrid stepfather who lives off of her bankroll because her mother had a very bad attorney. Rich Girl meets Bad Boy Sailor. Stepfather appears to hate Bad Boy Sailor, and in a fit one night barges in when Rich Girl and Bad Boy are in bed. Bad Boy shoots stepfather, Rich Girl covers up, Cop Friend immediately suspects Bad Boy, Stepfather's Girlfriend hangs self and to celebrate Rich Girl gets married to Bad Boy Sailor and finds out she is pregnant with Child and we then learn the truth about her Bad Boy Sailor when we see a great photo op on the wall at the cop's place. We then realize Cop is the Bad Cop, and the Bad Boy Sailor wants to play the good guy all because his hit is pregnant.. AW.. we feel sorry for him.. NOT.... This movie could have been better if the writer rewrote the Bad Boys and the plot a little differently. The movie ends on a surprise bad note and leaves you wishing that one of the characters ended up alive... If you watch.. beware because this movie can be watched in 10 minutes on fast foward and you can get the whole movie that way in less time so you don't end up disappointed.