# Conspiracy Theory (1997)

### reviewed by
Brian Takeshita

    CONSPIRACY THEORY

    A Film Review by Brian Takeshita

    Rating:  *1/2 out of ****

You think that these people only exist in the movies, but trust me, they're as real as life. I once talked to a guy who thought the United States government was putting satellites into orbit which could fry an individual person's brain with microwaves. Then I sat in a room full of people who believed that the government rigged state elections. I even listened to a man who swore that nicotine was an additive that cigarette companies put in their products for the specific goal of getting people addicted. These people had what are known as "conspiracy theories" - ideas about how unseen forces work to deceive and control the public. A little imagination goes a long way.

In Richard Donner's CONSPIRACY THEORY, Jerry Fletcher (Mel Gibson) is a New York City cab driver who seems to have a conspiracy theory about everything. His latest, that NASA is trying to kill the President by causing an earthquake from the space shuttle, might sound outrageous to us, but is all in a day's work for him. He combs the newspaper, looking for tidbits that leave telltale warnings about the goings-on behind the scenes, and from there Jerry draws his conclusions. Upstanding citizen that he is, he tries to convince Alice Sutton (Julia Roberts) of the Justice Department that the President must be warned. Lucky gal, Alice, who met Jerry when he saved her from a couple of muggers and has had to listen to his theories during the six months since. What she doesn't know is that Jerry's interest in her is far more than, well, professional. He goes to great lengths to follow her around and watch her in her own apartment. But when some secret government types seem to take an interest in Jerry's ideas and his limited-circulation "Conspiracy Theory" newsletter, he finds himself in danger and in real need of Alice's help.

One of the problems with CONSPIRACY THEORY is that it tries to pass itself off as an action-thriller when it seems to have neither a whole lot of action, nor a significant number of thrills. Part of this is a result of the film's slow pace. It takes forever to set up the relationship between Jerry and Alice, and even once that is over with, the rest of the film seems to be a lot of boredom that every once in a while stops to take a break for excitement. At over two hours, this film could have been significantly condensed and had it's running time shortened by twenty minutes to half an hour, but even then, the action scenes would not be able to save the film. Instead of truly exciting and engaging set pieces, we're treated to a few of the generic scenes with the requisite "black elements": Black helicopter, men in black action suits and body armor, black vehicles - you know the drill. They come on down with all kinds of neat gadgets and weapons, but for some reason a guy with just a bunch of theories and some chick with no training somehow manage to elude them every time. Big deal, we've seen it all before. Watching the film, I wished Donner had at least tried to use a little imagination, but I was out of luck.

Now, when I say it took forever to set up the "relationship" between Jerry and Alice, I completely mean what one person is relative to the other, and not romantic involvement. Oh, Donner and screenwriter Brian Helgeland would like you to believe that by the end of the movie, the two main characters will end up falling hopelessly in love with each other, but there seems to be no evidence of that ever occurring. You see, there were more sparks between Gibson and Danny Glover in the LETHAL WEAPON movies (also directed by Donner) than between Gibson and Roberts in CONSPIRACY THEORY. The two just don't click, and when you throw in a number of happenings that would cause Alice to reject Jerry altogether (like finding out he's been stalking her), the subsequent attraction is absolutely forced.

The script in general also seems forced, like someone sat Helgeland down and forced him to write it, then took it and forced it upon us. Dialog is undistinguished and rather unmemorable, to the point that I almost stopped listening. Even Gibson's usual gift for ad lib couldn't punch up the film sufficiently to raise my interest, although one of Jerry's theories about Oliver Stone was mildly amusing. Unfortunately, much of what's discussed in the film is not inherently important to what's going on, but instead filler that starts out with potential, but ends up just being extraneous because it's never followed through. For example, Jerry professes that a man found drowned in his swimming pool was actually murdered by the government in a New York subway station. He even goes so far as to explain that the station was flooded at the time due to a water main break (hence the water in a subway station), and that the coroner should check the man's lungs for chlorine. This is convincing enough to Alice that she seems to believe him. You know what happens then? Nothing, zip, nada. No follow-up whatsoever, so what's the significance? Okay, here's another one. A couple of well known (real life) assassins were found to have possessed copies of the J.D. Salinger novel "The Catcher in the Rye". Jerry also has a bunch of copies. Whenever he goes into a bookstore, he has to buy one. Leaving out the question of whether or not this makes Jerry an assassin, we're never given a reason to believe WHY this would make him an assassin. Not when we find out about his Salinger collection, not when he goes to the bookstore, not later on when we get the answer to our first question. The point becomes totally extraneous.

Oh, did I mention that Patrick Stewart is in this film? Yeah, he plays this government psychiatrist named Dr. Jonas who may or may not be a bad guy. That's about it. For all the presence this usually marvelous actor has, he's nearly forgettable in CONSPIRACY THEORY. You can just lump him in with the supporting players, with the exception of Cylk Cozart who plays Agent Lowry of the FBI. This guy was really likable, and I wish he and his character had gotten more screen time.

Okay, here's my theory. This really started out as a great film, but some of its jokes were actually true! The government came in and forced Donner to make edits for the sake of national security, and this was what was left over.

    Review posted July 14, 1999

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