Class Action (1991)

Directed by Michael Apted. Starring Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Gene Hackman, Colin Friels, Donald Moffat, Joanna Merlin, Fred Dalton Thompson, Laurence Fishburne, Jan Rubeš, Matt Clark, Jonathan Silverman, Joan McMurtrey, Anne Elizabeth Ramsay. [R]

A contrived setup, but one ripe with the potential for vivid character work and dramatic fireworks: civil attorney Hackman is representing an injured plaintiff in a suit against an automobile manufacturer, which is represented by Hackman’s estranged daughter (Mastrantonio). The two actors are in reliably credible, authoritative form, and the filmmakers should be lauded for not following a formula every step of the way, but the psychoanalysis is dim and the characteristics are predictable (she’s a more driven and corporate type and is sleeping with her boss, he’s a womanizer who sacrificed personal relationships for self-aggrandizing David vs. Goliath triumphs). With a clear-cut represented party in the wrong, the screenplay makes no effort to challenge the viewer into weighing the legal position that each side takes, leaving the drama in the hands of the family dynamic and waiting to see how far each one will go to win the case; however, even this intriguing moral quandary is defeated by foregone conclusions—there’s never any doubt that the leads will ultimately do what’s right. Photographed by Conrad L. Hall.

56/100