Shooting Fish . Newcity Chicago . 05-18-98

Shooting Fish

DIRECTED BY: Stefan Schwartz (III)

REVIEWED: 05-18-98

If only charm were as simple as a pattern of speech or the flop of a forelock. If only, "Shooting Fish" wonders at futile length. I wanted too much to like this strenuously zany romantic comedy, but its attractiveness comes down to two words: Kate Beckinsale. Without Beckinsale, the ingenuous Flora Poste of "Cold Comfort Farm," the classically cranky compulsive in Whit Stillman's upcoming "The Last Days of Disco," this movie would be dead in the water. Stefan Schwartz flings her toothy, beaming face into a sea of schemes and scams dreamt up by a pair of ostensibly charming con-men-cum-Peter Pans. The frenzied story, set in contemporary London, is written, directed and performed as if it were still the London of the 1960s. But the characters here aren't the Beatles. Fast-talking American Dan Futterman is teamed with Englishman Stuart Townsend, and their unconvincing fleecings of the rich are leavened somewhat by Beckinsale, their charming temp, who, wouldn't you know, turns out to be rich. A doctor. And, and, and.... Could she love one of these losers? It's always something. And Beckinsale? Is something else.

--Ray Pride

Capsule Reviews
Shooting Fish
Shooting Fish
Shooting Fish

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