"Attraction"

Here we have a movie that plants our feet back firmly on Late Nite Landfill ground. It's a salacious mix of violence, sex, and people bahaving badly.

I did find two descriptions of this movie that seem to contradict one another:

"A newspaper editor who is concerned about an employee stalking his ex-girlfriend soon begins doing the same thing."

---AND---

"A writer/radio advice show host fails to heed his own advice as he stalks his ex-girlfriend and then becomes involved with an actress friend of hers."

Further compounding matters, it appears in the trailer that after a girl's ex-boyfriend stalks her, her current boyfriend stalks the ex-boyfriend.

As the classic song "You say tomato, I say tomato" says, "let's call the whole thing off!"

Leaving the tangled mess of a plot behind, let's talk about the actors.

First, I have to mention poor Tom Everett Scott. Ever since his breakout role in "That Thing You Do," Hollywood just hasn't known what to do with him. It's obvious to me that his engaging, likeable charm is tailor-made for romantic comedies, screwball comedies and family comedies. In fact, not long after "That Thing..." I concocted a treatment for a big-screen remake of "Mister Ed," envisioning Scott as a natural choice to play the talking horse's human confidante, Wilbur. So what does Hollywood do with him? They put him in horror-comedies like "An American Werewolf in Paris," black comedies like "Dead Man on Campus" and (*gasp*) dramas like "Boiler Room" where we were supposed to buy him as a "you scratch my back, I'll break yours" ruthless financial broker. His last movie outing is a reverse of what I had in mind for him in "Mister Ed" - in "Snow Buddies," he's the VOICE of one of the dogs! Shame on you Hollywood, for misusing such an affable talent. In "Attraction," he looks particularly misused, as a seemingly-normal guy turned unhinged. The producers must have thought they had a profound character in this script, as they bill Scott not as "Tom Everett Scott" but as "Thomas."

The three other leading players have all had their share of success and failure over the years. The one who seems to be doing best is the other male lead, Matthew Settle, who currently has a recurring role on the TV show "Gossip Girl" amidst a host of TV and movie credits. Gretchen Mol has been at it for a little while now. People know at least her name, because her name is memorable. More so than her roles, of which the two most notable are probably playing Michael Madsen's girlfriend in "Donnie Brasco" and Christian Bale's wife in "3:10 to Yuma." She does a competent job in these roles which most actresses could essay. Finally, there's Samantha Mathis. She was one of those "it" girls for a while that got cast in a string of projects, but once Julia Stiles, Leelee Sobieski and Erika Christensen came along that was "it" for her.

An element that one of the above descriptions promises is one that's been beaten to death in movies, and usually very poorly done: the "provacative" radio talk show host. "Play Misty for Me" was one thing, having the great Clint Eastwood involved, but since then we've suffered through such depictions in films like "Talk Radio," a host of cable/direct-to-video offerings like "Midnight Confessions" (and I think Andrew Stevens produced some similar entries, too), and the recent execrable offerings "The Night Listener" and "The Brave One."

What more can I say? See for yourself.

View the trailer here:

visit videodetective.com for more info

Or watch the entire movie on WABC-TV Channel 7 at 11:35PM on Sunday, March 9th - if you dare!