I agree with Jay Leno, they should have called this movie I’ll never tell because I want to keep calling it that. In fact of all the dialog the only sentence you can repeat is, I’ll never tell.  Don’t Say a Word starring Michael Douglas (Traffic and A Perfect Murder) as child psychiatrist Dr. Nathan Conrad moves very fast. The time span begins the night before thanksgiving and ends the next evening. We are taken back in time 10 years a few times but that is only to set the scene present date. This thriller is unbelievably evil. The men that want the missing diamond are just heinous murderers so this is a little disturbing. You have to figure out everything extremely fast because if you don’t they let you know. As I said they waste no time. To start the film off we go back in time 10 years and a bunch of men take over a bank only to steal a large red diamond from a safe deposit box. You see the diamond dropped into the jewelry sack only to find out the guy palmed the rock and tricked his buddies.

Jump ahead present date the night before thanksgiving, Douglas is called over to this mental hospital he used to work at and Dr. Louis Sachs (Oliver Platt, of Lake Placid) begs him to take over the case of a catatonic Elisabeth Burrows (Brittany Murphy, from Girl Interrupted). The urgency is she attacked and practically mutilated an orderly at her last facility. She has been institutionalized since she was eight after she witnessed her father getting killed by a subway train. Douglas agrees to see her but doesn’t spend much time. He does recognize that a true catatonic holds their position when moved but Murphy does not. As he leaves this is when she states “you want what they want” a confused Douglas turns and asks “what who want?” then the memorable scene of Murphy rolling all over her bed uttering “I’ll never tell, I’ll never tell.” Douglas heads home to his laid up wife the down hill skier Aggie Conrad (Famke Janssen) and his sweet daughter. The next morning Douglas discovers his daughter has been abducted and the men that took her demand that he get a six digit number from Murphy by five that evening. Another pivotal character in this film is Detective Sandra Cassidy (Jennifer Esposito of Dracula 2000 and Summer of Sam) she has her own little storyline going at the same time that comes together with Douglas and Murphy in the end.

I found Don’t say a word, directed by Gary Fleder to be more violent and unremorseful than most movies. The fast paced nature, the fact that all scenes proved to be important to the overall plot made for a great movie. There was no down time, no boredom, no gratuitous scenes. Based on the nature of the film you knew how it was going to end you just didn’t know who was going to get wacked before the end when Douglas gets the number from Murphy. The writing credits go to Andrew Klavan who wrote the novel and Anthony Peckham who wrote the screenplay. The plot was conceivable only some might find it just a little extreme. I thought this movie was well done but just a little over the top on violence. I gave Don’t Say a Word an eight on the About-Movies.com scale.

Last updated: Saturday, October 28, 2006 05:37:36 PM

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