X
- 1996
- R
- 2 h 9 m
- 1996
- R
- 2 h 9 m
Summary Guilty? Innocent? Those questions aren't for high-powered Chicago attorney Martin Vail (Gere) to decide. His job is to defend - especially if a case will put his name in the headlines and further his career. When Vail hears that a penniless altar boy (Norton) is accused of murdering the local archbishop, he snaps up the case, eager for t...
Directed By: Gregory Hoblit
Written By: William Diehl, Steve Shagan, Ann Biderman
- 1996
- R
- 2 h 9 m
- 1996
- R
- 2 h 9 m
Primal Fear
47
8.4
Where to Watch
Summary Guilty? Innocent? Those questions aren't for high-powered Chicago attorney Martin Vail (Gere) to decide. His job is to defend - especially if a case will put his name in the headlines and further his career. When Vail hears that a penniless altar boy (Norton) is accused of murdering the local archbishop, he snaps up the case, eager for t...
Directed By: Gregory Hoblit
Written By: William Diehl, Steve Shagan, Ann Biderman
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 18 Critic Reviews
47
33% Positive
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
50% Mixed
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
17% Negative
3 Reviews
3 Reviews
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 18 Critic Reviews
47
33% Positive
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
50% Mixed
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
17% Negative
3 Reviews
3 Reviews
Riveting.
A tight courtroom melodrama that serves up twist after twist like so many baffling knuckle balls, this film handles its suspenseful material with skill and style.
User Score
Universal Acclaim
Based on 199 User Ratings
8.4
89% Positive
177 Ratings
177 Ratings
6% Mixed
11 Ratings
11 Ratings
6% Negative
11 Ratings
11 Ratings
User Score
Universal Acclaim
Based on 199 User Ratings
8.4
89% Positive
177 Ratings
177 Ratings
6% Mixed
11 Ratings
11 Ratings
6% Negative
11 Ratings
11 Ratings
Gere taps into his charismatic-weasel mode, but director Gregory Hoblit fills the big screen with excellent TV actors (Andre Braugher, John Mahoney, Maura Tierney) and then gives them nothing interesting to do.
Diverting without being fully absorbing, this is a film best appreciated as an exercise in--shall we say it?--Primal Gere. [15 Apr 1996, p.100]
The sky-high sleaze quotient -- lascivious priests, amateur porn movies, teenage hustlers and institutionalized corruption of every kind -- ought to guarantee fun for all, but heavy messages keep poking through and spoiling everything.
The special twist-which Paramount Pictures has implored critics not to divulge-redefines the story completely. It also ruins everything.
It should have been sent straight to video. As a courtroom drama, it stumbles from one ludicrous howler to another. Were the movie's "legal technical advisers" on another planet while the rest of the world was learning about legal procedure courtesy of the O.J. trial?
[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]
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I wish that the well-known twist in this movie had come with a little more power and wouldn't have been as predictable, but Primal Fear is engaging enough to work for a Saturday movie night. Gere and Norton give their characters a little more edge than what lesser actors would've done, and the story is only a few plot points short of plausible.
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+Great cinematography
+Excellent cast
-Below average screenplay
-Needless side plots
Primal fear's cast elevate the material to make for an entertaining movie but ultimately the audience will suffer at the hands of a made-for-tv-screenplay that falls short of the otherwise superb production value.
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I was rooting for everyone except for the newcomer and then Norton started taking charge of the energy in the room.
Primal Fear
Hoblit makes an excellent courtroom drama. Surprisingly, none of his films ever contributed anything new to that genre. In fact, I am just gonna come out and say it, it never even delivered what is already out there, well and established. A film that is so textbook and standard in its approach towards the characters and their arcs and their characteristics, you'd hope for it to at least gift you what you expect. The director Gregory Holbit doesn't throw such parties. His parties are a celebration. Celebrations that are completely misinterpreted and misunderstood, in what makes a celebration.. well, a celebration- I cannot stop using the word, celebration.
So how does a best selling novel, trending set of genre and an incredible cast prints a messy product out in the market? The answer is the laziness. Take the encounter of Frances McDormand and Laura Linney in the courtroom, later in the film. What should have been a hair pulling and nail biting scene, is instead played like a sloppy exhaustion of some labour work. The makers understands that antic smartly.
But never thinks of earning that moment in any dimension. It is enjoying too much with its sassy attitude, gloating for that undeserved achievement- at least that is what comes off in the end- to ever cast an impact. Which by the way, also turns out to be the role of Richard Gere as a complex lawyer in the film. He is enjoying too much to make you care for him and to add more into his troubles, he doesn't particularly have the most empathetic role in this case. Primal Fear will always be a symbol for seizing an opportunity to me, Edward Norton never lets go of his insatiable Joker-alike dual persona on the screen; it didn't speak to me as well as it did to others, but it definitely marked him on the map.
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L'intérêt de ce film procédurier à procédures réside dans son duo d'acteurs, l'un confirmé, l'autre très prometteur... ainsi Richard Gere très convaincant en ténor du Barreau prêt à défendre l'indéfendable (on en a aussi chez nous) qui donne la réplique à Edward Norton dans son rôle de psychodingo que le petit jeune maîtrise déjà parfaitement.
Le film vaut également le coup d'oeil pour son final d'une belle ironie, une sorte de cerise sur le gâteau inattendue... mais pour arriver jusque là, il faudra en passer par tous ces blablas d'avocaillons et de cour volubile qui durent une éternité : le rythme en pâtit énormément et le Jury s'est endormi depuis belle lurette.
La mise en scène très molle, typique d'un téléfilm à la petite semaine se révèle assommante et propice à un bon roupillon de l'audience bonne pomme que nous sommes, malgré les acteurs qui ne déméritent pas. Ah si on avait enlevé au moins une demi-heure à ces deux plombes, la physionomie du film en eut été radicalement changée. Peut-être.
Bref, objection Votre Honneur, le film est trop long et irrecevable en l'état... je demande un vote-sanction comme à Koh Lanta : Peur primale doit rentrer chez lui pour se reposer.
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Awards
Golden Globes, USA
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Academy Awards, USA
• 1 Nomination
Chicago Film Critics Association Awards
• 1 Win & 2 Nominations
