Heaven's Prisoners (1996) Reviews

• Robicheaux is a character well known to award winning writer James Burke

  lacarpool2007-07-25

  while this movie does not really capture the flavor of Burkes "prose" it's nice to see recognition of one of fictions better characters. Noticeably missing is the character "Clete Purcell" who was Dave R's former NOPD homicide partner. I see that Tommy Lee Jones will tackle A TV version of another Robicheaux mystery of which 16 Robicheaux novels have been written. Moe action by Baldwin and an interplay between he and the missing Clete Purcell might have brought this movie along further into another feature. New Orleans is always the great mixture of characters and places for mystery, murder and mayhem. Alex Baldwin does a great job given some of the missing flavor of James Lee Burkes writing. Baldwin made a great looking "Shadow" as well with an unfortunate script.

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• Kind of complicated, atmospheric crime thriller.

  rmax3048232005-09-19

  Nice shots of the bayou under the opening credits. Unspoiled rivers, pristine swamps, oaks draped with Spanish moss. It all looks rather promising. I guess you can still find such subtle but majestic littorals, maybe along route 90 around Houma, but from most highways in southern Louisiana all you see is oily swamp water with derricks planted in it. Beer cans and garbage and, quien sabe?, corpses floating in the murk. The movie's kind of like that too. The location shooting is just fine. Everyone sweats up a storm in the heat and humidity and it's no wonder that they head for the gin rickeys with all that ice. New Orleans is exposed in all its funkiness. The French Quarter is more or less avoided, but we get to see the lesser neighborhoods, now drowned and empty of human life in the wake of Katrina. There are the shotgun houses of the poor, the stripper bars playing bluesy music. The streetcars travel not through the Garden District but through ordinary residential streets. Beautiful in its own rotting way, almost phosphorescent with corruption. Outside the city there are bait shops that rent boats and sell tackle. One of these is run by Alec Baldwin, ex cop, recovering alcoholic. The story isn't very much, when you come right down to it. Hard to follow at times, not really captivating but not absolutely mainstream generic either. Baldwin has a marvelously normal family, including a stolen adopted girl, but is accidentally involved in some shenanigans I couldn't quite follow, something about smuggling, which draws the attention of the mob. Baldwin doesn't seem to actually DO anything that threatens their presence but they surround his house one lightning-filled night and do his loving and courageous wife (Kelly Lynch). The rest of the plot is a revenge story, with Baldwin tracking down the killers one by one. There are some good action scenes, a chase across the rooftops, a battle on a streetcar. All the action is done in slow motion so you get a chance to savor it -- the crashing crashing cars, the catapulting bodies, the muzzle flashes brilliantly lighting up the interiors of dark houses. PS: Mister Director, can we have a moratorium on slow-motion deaths? It's more than a cliché; it's positively decadent by now. Let's get together and blame Sam Pekinpah, okay? I thought the conclusion was pretty well done. After his wife is blasted to shreds by shotguns, an attractive young blond -- and old friend -- moves into his house in the woods and provides him with some emotional comfort. They once were quite close. Now -- see -- Baldwin's wife is gone, and he's got this little Latina girl that he's adopted, but there's a big hole in the nuclear family. (In other words, the guy needs a wife.) A conventional script calls for him to overcome his grief and fall in love with the reassuring and loving blond babe. But no. When he makes clear that he holds his wife's memory sacred, the blond leaves him a note and takes off, realizing he's not ready to get on with his life, as they say. The last scene has Baldwin in his house, gazing affectionately at his sleeping little girl, then falling on his back beside her. Sensing his presence she twists over and puts her arm around his chest, and he places his hand over hers and stares at the ceiling. It is not a cheap shot. It's a brief but genuinely tender scene, encompassing both love and the loss of it.

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• I beg to differ

  bob_bear2005-04-29

  I thought the opening scene was one of the best movie openings I've ever watched - beautifully written and sensitively played. Drawn in from the outset, I was happy to watch the plot unfold. Yes, it could be argued that the main protagonist brings his troubles upon himself but that is hardly a plot fault - some people do. Problems with the film? I don't know why an actress of Mary Stuart Masterson's caliber should take on such a nothing role. And the plane crash looked cheap and unconvincing. Otherwise, I have no complaints. I love the books and I thoroughly enjoyed the film. I have read the previous reviews which seem to be critical for the most part and I am left wondering why they are so. I've watched a lot of rotten films and this certainly isn't one of them. I give it an eight out of ten. I enjoyed it.

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• Great work by the cast..

  Hollywood-32000-05-28

  Great work by the cast - not so great when it comes to the writing. Heaven's Prisoners lacked a couple of key elements in writing and the film suffered as a result. Once again Kelly Lynch did a fantastic job and made tremendous use of limited screen time. Baldwin wasn't too bad either. This probably ranks as one of his best performances along with The Hunt for Red October. Teri Hatcher was HOT. Overall - Heaven's Prisoners is worth renting - if only to check out the great work by a talented, if not successful, cast.

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• Another Pretty Solid Modern 'Noir'

  ccthemovieman-12006-03-29

  I guess you could call this a "neo-noir," which is a modern-day film noir. It has that atmosphere, especially in New Orleans which seems to always been pictured on the seamy side in films. After the devastation that took place there last year, perhaps filmmakers will kinder to the city in future movies. Anyway, a seedy New Orleans, some good blues music and five varied-and-all interesting lead characters make this a very watchable movie. Alec Baldwin, Kelly Lynch, Teri Hatcher, Mary Stuart Masterston and Eric Roberts all contribute with good performances All but Roberts are the "good guys" in this one. The movie keeps your attention and has you involved for most of the two hours. The action is well-dispersed. My only complaint is a small one: Baldwin with the southern accent doesn't sound natural. Otherwise, a good modern-day crime story.

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