American hostage in the clutches of fallen Marxist money-grubbing guerrillas in the mythical Latin American nation of Tecala. It all might have been more bearable if only the hostage's wife were someone other than Meg Ryan. With her swollen, flattened, pink-painted lips, her Gorgonian hairdo of braided snakes, her flirtatiously cocked head, her hippie-dippy wardrobe, Ryan is at all times, no matter how stressful, concerned firstly and foremostly to look fetching -- such that the main point of her emotional collapse in the kitchen, for example, appears to be the adorable post-Flashdance way that the sleeves of her sweater extend past the knuckles as she brushes away the tears. Pamela Reed provides a short-lived alternative and antidote as the meddlesome in-law, until she is peremptorily sent back to the States to scrape together the ransom and is never heard from again. Russell Crowe, as the pro bono hostage negotiator nursing a heavy crush on the victim's wife, or in other words a pro boner negotiator, matches his character's purported expertise with a most becoming and befitting modesty. And director Taylor Hackford marshals some acceptable action -- a long time coming -- in the crisply co-ordinated raid on the guerrilla stronghold. David Morse, David Caruso. (2000) — Duncan Shepherd
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