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| DIRECTED BY |
| Arthur Penn |
| STARRING |
| Gene Hackman |
| Jennifer Warren |
| James Woods |
| Melanie Griffith |
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The film is deceptively simple and almost even boring until � around the final 30 minutes � in the blink of an eye it shifts into overdrive; the plot twists take place at rapid speed and the whole thing seems to get almost too complex. Nonetheless, this makes for quite a mind-bending final act in comparison to the lethargic pace that preceded it � this is a pretty dangerous writing technique by Alan Sharp, as many viewers just don�t have much patience. Perhaps if the pacing was tighter and the first act of the film had been a little more creative with its protagonist�s exploits then it would�ve been more entertaining.
�Night Moves� is nonetheless a notable film noir thanks to its sense of uncompromising realism � even in relation to detective Harry Moseby (Hackman in top 'no bullshit' form.) The film emits a great atmosphere too, sometimes depicting a pre-�Body Heat� darkness around its characters within the Floridian nighttime. We also get some amazingly weird dialogue: our �femme fatale� speaks of Kennedy assassinations and hard nipples � this certainly beats out trite conventionality. Speaking of this character � she sometimes seem too enigmatic, jumping between different motivations in order to fit the plot. The male villain could�ve also been depicted a lot more menacingly too, but that clearly didn�t concern Penn because he was going for a truly realistic modern film noir tale here.
I love the �Night Moves� theme � it�s a perfectly catchy rhythm and (surprisingly enough) the whole soundtrack doesn�t seem dated at all today. The film�s final few scenes form a spectacular Grand Guignol and some amazing underwater cinematography � it�s a bittersweet tragedy of an ending (even if that plane�s punctual arrival is a little too neat) � Moseby�s solved his case, but at so much expense and Hackman makes Moseby stand out as perhaps the most human of all film noir detectives.
