I can’t wait till the day someone uses this film as a real world defense. Although, those circumstances are so specific. You’d have ton be convicted of murdering someone not dead, and then find that person who has been off the grid all those years, and then kill them to challenge the idea that this film is nonsense.
But, I think that is what makes the film so damn entertaining, is that we can root for Ashley Judd. Very few films outside the horror genre have someone who you hope will succeed in their quest to kill. Often, there’s some line that can never be crossed, or lines about losing that part of yourself, or lowering yourself to that level, and there’s some last minute redemption.However, here, we don’t have that. Ashley Judd is totally right to seek her justice, and we are here to watch.
Sure, this feels incredibly 90’s, but as I explore all these Anniversary titles this year, i was pleased as punch to see Double Jeopardy on Paramount Plus with audio description. What a pleasant surprise. Ashely Judd had a knack in the late 90’s for choosing films that could have gotten her a populist vote to awards glory. There’s really no reason she couldn’t have been in the mix for kiss The Girls, and Double Jeopardy was this surprise September sleeper that very much had its fans.
I didn’t even see this right away, but after my Mom loved it, I made it a point to see this. I loved it too. It’s a revenge thriller. It’s about a mother wanting her kid back. How can you not like this? How could you like anything else?
Now, Tommy Lee Jones is playing that government agent role that has so propped up his entire life, especially in the 90’s. Sure, here he’s just a parole officer, but between films like The Fugitive, The Client, Men In Black, US Marshals, and I guess to some extent Volcano, we did get to see Jones in pretty much this type of role all the time.
Did it hold up 25 years later? Basically. I still had fun with it. I can tell the film isn’t perfect, but it never was. It has audio description that based on everything i can remember about the film did a good job of tracking everything. It feels so very 90’s. it feels like it belongs with that group of films, some of which are actually classics, but many are just popcorn fare.
I’d consider this for my desert island list. I have a feeling it would just miss the cut, but the fact that 25 years later I liked it enough still to think about watching it again in my life really speaks to how fun this was to begin with.
