DERAILED

UK/USA, 2005, 108 minutes, Colour.
Clive Owen, Jennifer Aniston, Vincent Cassell, Melissa George, Giancarlo Esposito, David Morrissey, Tom Conti, Rachel Blake.
Directed by Mikael Hafstrom.

For about twenty minutes, one can’t help thinking that we seen this all before: nice family, tensions, husband with a roving eye, the beginning of an affair. From that moment on, the screenplay twists and turns in an entertainingly tantalising way. That means it is not fair to say too much more about the plot – a multiplex thriller that achieves what it sets out to do.

The film has interesting credentials. While the setting is Chicago, much of the film was made in a London
studio. Clive Owen has a role that suits him. He is often taciturn and unsmiling in his films and while, on the whole he is like that here, he has many good reasons for not smiling. The object of his wayward affection and behaviour is Jennifer Aniston acting against her Friends type – and quite credibly in view of plot developments. French star, Vincent Cassel, is frighteningly persuasive as a thug on the loose in Chicago, mostly brutal and repellent but able to turn on charm when it suits him. The screenplay, from a novel by James Siegel, has been written by Australia Stuart Beattie who impressed in 2004 with his writing of Collateral.

If you are looking for a thriller with twists and with moral dilemmas about a man who makes a terrible mistake with consequences for his family and friends that make him desperate, try this. What would we do?

1.An entertaining thriller? Tangles relationships? The fatal attraction genre? Variations on the theme?

2.The Chicago settings, homes, offices, trains, the streets? Affluent areas? Seedy hotels? The waterfront? The musical score?

3.The title and its reference to Charles Schine and his life, relationships, career?

4.The familiarity of the plot – the unhappily married man, his wandering eye, the femme fatale, the deception? The reversing of roles? Vindication and revenge?

5.Charles, his relationship with his wife, family? The scenes at home? Tension? His going to work, getting the train? Train difficulties? The encounter with Lucinda Harris? Her paying his fare? His feeling indebted? The attraction, the journeys? The decision to go to the hotel? The beginning of the affair? The intrusion of the robber, Charles knocked unconscious, Lucinda being raped?

6.The consequences? Lucinda and her refusing to go to the police, not wanting the affair to be exposed? The effect on Charles? The intruder, contacting Charles, asking for twenty thousand dollars? Charles, the dilemma, getting the money? His diabetic daughter and the medical treatment fund? His taking it? The continued blackmail, the intruder wanting one hundred thousand dollars? Charles, his dilemmas, trying to cope? The visits to Lucinda, her refusing to go to the police?

7.Charles, the discussions with Winston, Winston and his convict background, the deal for him to scare La Roche? Charles and his taking the money from the office? His clashes with his boss? Going the river, with Winston, Winston being shot dead by La Roche? The police car, Charles not being able to give the cash? Charles and his dumping Winston’s body and concealing it? His giving the money to La Roche – the threat to kill Lucinda?

8.Charles, the moral dilemma, his confession to his wife?

9.The chance encounter with Lucinda, discovering who she really is? Seeing her with La Roche? Their relationship? His realising what had happened? Her picking up another client, the same procedure, his hiding in the hotel, the dead client? La Roche’s arrival, the confrontation with La Roche, the shoot-out, Jane and La Roche seeming dead? Charles and his getting his money, the arrest for embezzlement?

10.Charles, community service, the prison teaching job, the writing of the story? His being told to go to the laundry? The confrontation with La Roche, La Roche having survived his gunshot wounds? Charles with his knife (the gift from Winston)? The struggle, Charles stabbing La Roche?

11.The role of Detective Church, his being a friend of Winston’s, the discussions about what had happened, his collaborating, his turning a blind eye to the killing in the prison?

12.Charles and his return to his family – the experience, chastened?

13.The perennial popularity of this kind of violent and romantic story? And the wages of sin?