The Worst Film Ever

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

Tony Scott's the fan is a wild ride with an off the hook turn from Robert De Niro. It's ranked and regarded as a pretty low notch on Scott's belt, but it's hard to compete with his best work. It's still a sleazy blast and pure Scott, his characters always let, lurid and delightfully pulpy. Sure it falls apart near the end, but until then it's nasty, delicious fun. De Niro plays Gil, a die hard baseball fan and devout follower of Bobby Rayburn (Wesley Snipes), star player for his favourite team. Gil wants Bobby to succeed so badly that he becomes violent, unstable and pretty bonkers. At first it's obnoxious and amusing, but soon he gets dodgy and dangerous and eventually just out of control. It's great fun seeing De Niro go bug nuts bit by bit, and he's always had a wild menace that he like to take down from the shelf and dust off for the occasional performance. Benicio Del Toro does one of his puzzling, indecipherable vocal riffs as a rival player, adding to the weird factor. Ellen Barkin is a sexy sass bomb as Jewal Stern, a mouthy talk show host who sniffs out the controversy in high style. John Leguizamo is always sterling, and classes his scenes up like a pro. Watch for speckled cameos from M.C. Gainey, Brad William Henke, Don S. Davis, Tuesday Knight, Wayne Duvall, Richard Rhiele, John Carrol Lynch, Michael P. Michael P Byrne and Chris Mulkey as well, all excellent. Not Scott's best for sure, but a nicely mean spirited little romp through the psycho stalker fields. Fun stuff.

From the opening scenes of 'The Fan', it's all too obvious that the late Tony Scott was a strange choice of director for a suspense thriller. Scott's trademark flashy visuals, breathless camera work and hyperactive editing are there from the outset as die-hard San Francisco Giants fan Gil (Robert De Niro), speeds across town in his van while engaging in a somewhat bizarre radio phone-in about the Giants' new $40 million star signing Bobby Rayburn (Wesley Snipes).Once things calm down a little, we learn that Gil is a hunting supplies salesman who's having a tough time meeting his targets and is under threat of losing his job. Gil is also divorced and struggling to manage access to his son.When opening day arrives, separate incidents mark a serious downturn in fortunes for both Gil and Bobby, with Gil eventually developing a disturbing obsession with the slugger, thus setting off a frightening chain of events.'The Fan' is remarkable for a suspense thriller in that it lacks any real suspense. Although Tony Scott wasn't helped by a threadbare and illogical script, the clunky camera-work and jumpy editing mar any feeling of involvement or tension for the viewer in many of the scenes, with the excessive use of close ups beginning to grate after a while. Also, the baseball scenes feel very unnatural and stagey. Most regrettable are the attempts to portray the characters' motivations to the audience, which are two dimensional at best, downright lazy at worst. As the movie jumps from one unlikely encounter and set of circumstances to another, all credibility quickly unravels.What rescues this movie from outright mediocrity are the excellent performances from a terrific cast, with De Niro and Snipes both being engaging despite their rather clichéd and poorly scripted roles. The supporting cast is top drawer, with John Leguizamo as Bobby's unscrupulous agent and Ellen Barkin's languid radio host being highlights, especially in their all too brief scenes together.Over and above the poor quality of the script, you're left with the impression that this is a movie with plenty of style but little in the way of substance. A different choice of director would have helped this movie be more than the mediocre pulp fare that it is, as although Scott was a fine director, creating tension and projecting believable characters was not his forte. Although 'The Fan' is fairly watchable in parts, by the time the hammy and frankly ludicrous final act is over, you're left with a feeling that it could all have been so much better.

Gil Renard (Robert De Niro) is a failing knife salesman, a SF Giants fanatic, a divorced father of a boy, and a very angry guy. Bobby Rayburn (Wesley Snipes) is a new sign to the ball club, and the hope for savior. Both men's lives go downhill.Director Tony Scott has made a movie filled with flash and sizzle. It doesn't accentuate as much as distract. When there is a master thespian like Robert De Niro, all the extra fireworks just take the focus away from the real show. And Wesley Snipes isn't likable enough. A less stereotypical selfish black athlete may help. His scenes with his agent Manny (John Leguizamo) are annoying and tiresome. This could have been a creepy character study like the iconic 'Taxi Driver'. But it never allows De Niro any peace and quiet to do his work properly.

Gil Renard is obsessed with baseball. Because he is from San Francisco he is a fan of the Giants, by the beginning of the season the Giants have signed all-star centre-fielder Bobby Rayburn to a 40 Million dollar contract.But, things do not go well for both Gil and Rayburn. Rayburn is slumping and Gil loses his job and eventually his wife and son.Gil goes deeper into his obsession with Rayburn and takes matters into his own hands. He believes that Rayburn is slumping because of another Giants player named Juan Primo who is playing well.Gil secretly helps him out. But when Gil feels that Rayburn is ungrateful, Gil kidnaps his son.Now, Rayburn must perform at his best at the last game of the season in order to save his son...I don't know why, but I have a lot of love for this movie. It's not perfect by any means, and Scott has really gone to town on the editing here, but everyone has a film that they love that was critically mauled.De Niro is at this archetypal best here as Gil, a paint by the numbers psycho, who isn't spontaneous, but predictable, and still very creepy.Snipes proves in this that the mid nineties were the best for his career, as he puts in another great performance, and during the final third, really shows depth and emotion.There is great support from Leguizamo and Barkin, and the film is made slickly with a brilliant soundtrack, but if you look closer, there are lots of faults in this.It's one of those rare occasions with a movie that I really don't care about the faults or the plot holes or the blatant use of stunt doubles.The eighteen year old in me is still calling for the flashy editing, silly use of knives and De Niro in full psycho mode, and I still love it.