Cinema surveillance images are loading at the bottom of the page
The Spanish prisoner
Threat advisory: Guarded - General risk of entertaining activities
Movie propaganda
Joe Ross (Campbell Scott) is a trusting man, but everyone has his limit. Having invented a mysterious and immensely valuable new process for his company, Joe fears being robbed of this by the very men for whom he works and thus being cut out of the enormous profit that will undoubtedly be made. A chance meeting with jet-setter Jimmy Dell (Steve Martin) leads to more doubts in Joe's mind, and Jimmy offers to lend his assistance in Joe's battle for fair monetary consideration for the invention.
As Joe's relationship with his boss, Klein (Ben Gazzara), deteriorates, so does Joe's understanding of what is going on around him. Are the people surrounding him, his supposed friends, as they seem, or is there something darker underneath? As all of Joe's associates, including his boss, friend George Lang (Ricky Jay), infatuated secretary Susan (Rebecca Pidgeon), and even the FBI, pledge their support, Joe becomes caught in a dangerous web of truth and fiction, of appearances... and disappearances.
Persons of interest
- Campbell Scott .... Joseph A "Joe" Ross
- Steve Martin .... Julian "Jimmy" Dell
- Rebecca Pidgeon .... Susan Ricci
- Ben Gazzara .... Mr Klein
- Ricky Jay .... George Lang
- Felicity Huffman .... Pat McCune
- Tony Mamet .... FBI Agent Levy
- Lionel Mark Smith .... Detective Jones
- Jim Frangione .... Detective Luzzio
- David Mamet .... Screenwriter
- David Mamet .... Director
Cinematic intelligence sources
Intelligence analyst
Special Agent Matti
Theatrical report
Having just seen A perfect murder the other day, which was a tense and dramatic thriller full of increasingly dark twists and turns, I was somewhat disappointed by The Spanish prisoner.
The latter seemed stilted by comparison, knotted like a ball of string thrown into the back of the drawer rather than an intricately woven web of deceit. There was such a welter of characters and motivations that the actual plot got lost from time to time. It promoted confusion rather than concentration.
That said, it isn't a terrible movie. Where A perfect murder has slick production values and an immense budget, The Spanish prisoner has deeply drawn characters and scope. Where the former is claustrophobic, the latter is agoraphobic. One is ever increasing pools of darkness, the other is ever increasing pools of despair.
The acting is no better or worse, the dialogue is a bit more theatrical, and there is a huge error at the end: the baddie ends up on the boat that no-one knew the goodie was going to catch.
Apart from those criticisms, it was an ok movie, entertaining enough, but didn't really do it for me. As my friend David said, "I got a bit lost in the middle".
Security censorship classification
PG (Medium level violence)
Surveillance time
110 minutes (1:50 hours)
Not for public release in Australia before date
Film: Undated 1998
Cinema surveillance images
