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| ALARMIST RESULTs Found 1 categories 1 way to help U |
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ALARMIST REVIEW
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| ALARMIST RESULTs Found 1 categories 1 way to help U |
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ALARMIST REVIEW
by John Hartl
**1/2 ``The Alarmist,'' with David Arquette, Stanley Tucci, Kate Capshaw, Ryan Reynolds, Mary McCormack. Written and directed by Evan Dunsky. 93 minutes. Broadway Market Cinemas. ``R'' - Restricted because of sexuality and language.
The jangly score, the facetious performances and the black-comedy attitudinizing suggest that "The Alarmist" means to be yet another "Pulp Fiction" clone.
It's a bit better than that, even though it's a hit-and-miss affair, and ultimately rather frustrating because parts of it work so well.
Based on Keith Reddin's Off-Broadway play, "Life During Wartime," it stars David Arquette as Tommy Hudler, a new door-to-door salesman for a Los Angeles home-security system company that's managed by smarmy Heinrich Grigoris (Stanley Tucci).
Tommy has an all-American boy appeal that gets him inside the door, particularly when women are there to open it. Soon he's having a full-fledged affair with a widowed customer, Gale (Kate Capshaw), whose large son, Howard (Ryan Reynolds), isn't much younger than Tommy.
The two boys don't know quite what to make of the situation, though there's an odd, shifting father-son quality to their talks, during which Howard more or less explains sex to Tommy.
Even odder is Heinrich's way of drumming up business. At night, he breaks into homes to demonstrate that the owners need alarm systems. If they already have one, he can then push for an upgrade.
"It's just business," Heinrich insists. Tommy, who is on the verge of becoming a television celebrity because of the successful commercials he's done for the company, wants nothing to do with Heinrich's methods, even when he's told that burglaries are down and this is the only way for the company to stay afloat. He distances himself from Heinrich and blames him with a vengeance when something goes seriously wrong.
Once Tommy takes Gale home to meet the folks (played by Michael Learned and Arquette's real father, Lewis), the story lurches into another mode altogether. Tensions mount, Gale decides she can't handle her boyfriend's family, threats are made. The moral seems to be that, if you're going to buy an alarm system, it's best to turn it on.
It's hardly a theme to build a movie around. Long before it's over, "The Alarmist" feels undernourished and directionless. But the script is more about relationships than plot anyway, and first-time director Evan Dunsky has the actors to handle them.
The movie is a series of duets, between Arquette and Tucci, Arquette and Capshaw, Arquette and Reynolds, Capshaw and Learned. It's at its most entertaining when it's simply observing the eccentric connections among them.
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