Wow! Such a good movie.

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

A Brilliant Conflict

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

Donald Cammell's final film, the censorious treatment of which, probably drove him to take his life, is a stupendous tour de force, the likes of which you are unlikely to have seen before. Steven Bauer is scarily violent and believably ruthless. Joan Chen is beautiful and commanding while Anne Heche is astonishingly effective in a complicated and ever changing role as she interacts with the other three main participants. Christopher Walken allows his character to take him over almost completely and occasionally seems to struggle to stay this side of sanity. This is a nightmare of a performance in which he turns himself inside out to portray the true horror of ultimate power and greed. I will not divulge the simple plot as Cammell tells it so well it is far better that this terrible tale unfold as he intended. Suffice to say, the aforementioned acting is faultless, the direction sure footed and the editing an object lesson and for once the word 'sensational' is most apt.

One can describe the core of 'Wild Side' in just two single words: sex + action. It is a receipt that always works.Consquently this film lacks any depth. It just shows a bunch of hyper-people, picturing characters that some among us should like to identify with. If you don't, 'Wild Side' urges you to use the speed-up button on your DVD-playing machine.Positive: this film provides some coherent story, and is able to keep your attention all the way down. Although still far under his James Bond-level, male lead Christopher Walken's credible performance lifts 'Wild Side' from its depths.

I remember reading a review of this in one of those phone book sized movie guides you can get at a book store. They gave it their lowest rating, saying that it looked like it was all improvised in a series of motel room and apartments.Yea, I can kind of see it.Anyways, Wild Side is an OK noir film of sorts about a bank worker by day, high class prostitute by night (Heche) who gets involved with a crime boss (Walken) and his sexy girlfriend (Chen). Heche and Chen end up falling in love, and concoct a plan of sorts to get away.The film probably would have faded away if it wasn't for the scorcher of a love scene between Heche and Chen. With an agonizingly erotic set up (a long dinner date between the two, followed by a first kiss in the womens bathroom), the actual love scene is allowed to play out nice and slow, in a big bedroom with the summer light and breeze blowing in. Seriously guys (and girls, I guess) this is everything you could want in a scene like this.I wish I could say the movie around it was memorable enough to live up to that kind of glory, but it really doesn't. I'm sure Donald Cammell was a great director, and it's probably real sad that the film was chopped up before he could finish it to it's satisfaction. But I've got a feeling that whatever state this movie was supposed to in, it would have turned out the same.Eroticism aside, the lesbian scene is asthetically like a breath of fresh air. It's bright, and wide open in the way it plays out across the screen. Compared to that, the rest of the movie really does play too dark; It really is kind of like sitting with your legs crossed on the floor in the corners of dark apartments while listening to other people talk. Dreary, in other words.By the way, check out the Canadian video cover for this one compared to the static "3 portraits" cover we got in America. A classic example of how just how puritanical our culture can be sometimes.

Anne Heche, Christopher Walken, Joan Chen, and Steven Bauer have never been better in this quirky, daring, amusing, and erotic thriller. Try to catch it on pay cable, where it's regularly aired. Apparently, the director's cut is even better.