Double Jeopardy

Buy This Item Double Jeopardy by Paramount  Available from Amazon  $9.99  on 11-25-2008     Young Libby Parsons (Ashley Judd) is happy as a clam, and why not? She's got a loving, successful husband (Bruce Greenwood), an adorable son, and an island home to die for. One morning, after a romantic sailing expedition with her husband, Libby finds herself covered in blood. Her husband's missing, the boat resembles a murder scene, and there's a knife on the deck. One might stop right there and call for help; Libby, however, takes matters--or, more specifically, the knife--into her own hands, and the moment she does, there's the Coast Guard. Faster than you can say frame-up, Libby's been charged with murder and jailed, with her young son stripped from her custody. It's all cut-and-dried, except for one thing: Libby's husband isn't dead, and she's about to track him down. And thanks to the Fifth Amendment's double jeopardy rule, she can't be charged twice for his murder. <p> <I>Double Jeopardy</I> has a singularly seductive revenge premise and, in Judd, one of the most seductive leading ladies to grace the silver screen in recent years. So then why does this thriller feel like it came from the bottom of the Lifetime television movie barrel? Instead of taking a gritty, hard-boiled approach, the film plays up all of Libby's mushy emotions--tellingly, the director here is Bruce Beresford, whose best film, <I>Driving Miss Daisy</I>, is as far from thriller territory as you can get. No matter how stoically or deviously Judd plays her, Libby comes across as a soccer mom with a slight taste for blood. Only in a few scenes, specifically when she tracks her wily husband to his new identity in New Orleans, does Judd get to strut her stuff, stealing an evening gown and crashing his charity auction. Most of the time, though, this thriller offers only a smattering of suspense. Well, at least like Libby, the filmmakers can't be condemned twice for the same crime. With Tommy Lee Jones duplicating his <I>Fugitive</I> role, as Libby's conscientious parole officer. <I>--Mark Englehart</I> Reader Reviews I was visiting a senior citizen friend who asked me if I had ever seen this movie. To tell the truth, I couldn't be sure just which Ashley Judd thrillers I had seen and which I hadn't, but since my friend seemed so fond of the movie, I couldn't really object to watching it with him. Two minutes into the darn thing, however, I realized this was indeed the one Judd potboiler I HAD seen, and the basic premise about a woman framed for her husband's murder came back to me, but the specifics of the plot had been lost in the haze of memory, I figured, why the heck not re-watch it? As it turned out, however, this was not the kind of movie I would usually watch a second time. It is, as many reviewers are quick to point out, entertaining enough, despite its many plot holes and apparent legal incongruities (thank you to the many commentators who have maintained that legally you CAN be tried for the same murder twice, if it's proven that the first "murder" did not actually take place). But, OK, we'll suspend legal disbelief and go along with the conceit. And we'll also go along with the conceit that hatred and a passionate desire for vengeance could turn a fairly conventional soccer mom into a lean, mean fighting machine--who also happens to be diabolically clever and resourceful. Well, "diabolically clever" when she isn't doing something extremely dumb and ultimately self-destructive, that is. (SLIGHT SPOILER WARNING) I would have to agree with those reviewers (including the Amazon reviewer above) who maintain that the movie is weakened considerably by making Ashley Judd's character more traditionally maternal than bitterly vengeful. Had she been so consumed by hatred that she was ready, willing and eager to take advantage of the (specious) double jeopardy clause, the movie would have been more suspenseful. (Will she be driven to the edge? Will she pull back into something like sanity at the nick of time?) But really, all she seems to want is her kid back--and she'll let criminal bygones be bygones. And, aww shucks, isn't THAT understandable? Which is not to say that Ashley Judd isn't as elegant as ever or that Tommy Lee Jones doesn't give his usual solid performance. The movie is fast-paced enough to keep the viewer's attention. And there are plenty of unforeseen plot turns, lots of changes of scenery and some interesting supporting roles (that I also wished had been fleshed out a little more). One striking aspect was the change in the physical appearance of the young actress, Annabeth Gish. The cute, pert young girl from ST. ELSEWHERE and MYSTIC PIZZA seems suddenly almost Amazonian here. Not unattractive, but certainly no longer the sweetly innocent young thing she played so handily as a teen/young adult. Ten years later, she's got enough of that sinister thing going on that no one would ever call her miscast here. We all demand different things from movies: that's a given. I could see that my senior citizen friend was drawn to the movie, in part, because of the striking opening shots of the Washington State coast--a part of the country where he had spent a good deal of time as a young man. That and the fact that he seems to like thrillers in general. I do too, but I like to see my characters just a tad more developed. It helps me to care about their fates.

Double Jeopardy Available from Amazon Price: $9.99 Updated on 11-25-2008.

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