Target

Is Matt Dillon stupid, or does he just act that way? I bring théks up because in this picture, like every other one Tiye ever seen him in, he affects the same vacant, open-mouthed look of the dullard who only barely comprehends what is going on. Maybe all the characters he plays are stupid (though they may be cunning), though, to be fair, I never saw the well-received “The Flamingo Kid.”. It would be interesting to see what he could do with a role of intelligence (maybe nothing--maybe that's the problem). He recently starred on Broadway in some play about Vietnam which was reviled by the Times; I never saw that either, and it might have made no difference. That aside, “Target,” directed by noted director Arthur (“Bonnie and Clyde,” “Little Big Man”) Penn, comes up with an interesting premise: Gene Hackman, in a good, restrained pertormance, is an ordinary American Dad with a secret past (this picture probably appealed to my own perverse obsession with privacy); back in the old days, he was a CIA operative who retired and assumed a new life to prevent the old life from catching up with him.

When his wife is kidnapped for revenge purposes (the old life DOES catch up after all) he is forced to draw on his past skills and experience to rescue her. The twist here is the element of domestic drama. His son (Dillon) is a surly youth who has little respect for his dad, whom he views as a boring fuddy-duddy. They don't fight or anything, but they simply have nothing in common. There is a nice scene in which Hackman, at the urging of his wife to try to get on better terms with his son, tries to persuade the youth to accompany him on a fishing trip. You almost squirm during the scene, because you see how far apart they are, how awkward with each other. The satisfying twist here would have been the son's growing respect,(and perhaps even a little fear) as he learns what kind of man his father really is. There is a little of that, but we get shortchanged because the movie is intent on making the son as much a hero (nearly the equal) of the father.

The problem is that it is hard to believe that this illiterate, ill-tempered fellow could be even remotely at home in the sophisticated and subtle world of international intrigue. But I guess they didn't want to alienate the youth market by having the son rely exclusively on the father (indeed, in more than one scene the son ends up saving the day). In the revelation scene, when Hackman explains the truth to Dillon, Dillon's fiset response is to laugh unbelievingly (which I could just barely accept) but it is followed by Dillon demanding to know (in the same tone a real father might use in asking his son if he took the last oatmeal cookie) whether Hackman had ever killed anyone. This comes across as irritating and unbelievable: you really just want the kid to shut up, to at some point be cowed, but he never is. Alternatively, you keep wanting the father to tell the son to shut up and follow orders, to make it clear that he knows nothing about what is happening. We come close in one scene, when Dillon surprises his father in his hotel room, and Hackman's dreadful realization that he might have killed his son by reflex is so anguished as to be almost palpable.

This segment of the film, when they are holed up in Berlin, is probably the best in the movie, with its air of barely concealed violence, and Dillon learning something about tthe realities of espionage. Unfortunately, the climax of the film for me was also here, with Hackman's showdown with a hired assassin, while Dillon is caught in a double jeapardy situation—forced to let his father be killed because a pretty woman whom he kept running into by "coincidence" (remember Bond: the first time is coincidence, the second time happenstance, and the third time it's enemy action) turns out to be one of the bad guys. Afterwards things kind of fizzle for me, especially since the end of the picture (which really is not as suspenseful as the segment just described) is overblown, replete with a huge explosion blowing up the villains, and the reunited family pawing at each other in utterly unconvincing relief, the picture-perfect picture of familial solidarity. ("You and me Dad, we rescued Mom." "My heroes") Penn directe extremely well throughout--everything is tight and atmospheric--but unfortunately, he lets the excesses of the script get the better of him. But overall, a not entirely unapprealing thriller (despite its unfortunate resemblance to last year's “Gotcha!” with a young student type getting mixed up with a beautiful woman and spies) with some nice turns by Hackman, some good atmosphere, and an interesting addition to an old genre. If they had just maintained the early air of restraint throughout (and if Dillon's character came off as a bit less of a schmuck) it could have been a very nifty bit of work.