Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 15, 1994 TAG: 9401150059
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: C-12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By MIKE MAYO CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The rest of the film is part courtroom drama, part social-political commentary, and those tend to cancel each other out. Though the groundwork is laid for a conventional legal thriller - with lies, clues and deceit aplenty - that side of the story is abandoned in the second half. When the film addresses serious contemporary issues - AIDS, discrimination, attitudes toward homosexuality - it's too simplistic to have any real meaning.
Director Jonathan Demme and a high-powered cast do their best to turn the story into crowd-pleasing Hollywood entertainment, and they have several effective moments. Co-stars Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington do some of their best work to date. But they're not enough to overcome the inherent problems in Ron Nyswander's script.
Andrew Beckett (Hanks) and Joe Miller (Washington) practice law at opposite ends of the Philadelphia legal spectrum. Miller is a self-promoting hustler who runs tacky ads on TV and will do just about anything for a buck. Beckett is a rising star at a classy, well-respected firm led by Charles Wheeler (Jason Robards).
When the firm's partners learn that Beckett has AIDS, they fire him. The pretext is a letter about an important case that mysteriously goes missing from his desk and computer, but Beckett is certain that his medical condition is the real reason. He decides to sue for damages, and tries to find a lawyer. At first, fearing the disease, Miller refuses to take the case. Eventually he changes his mind, of course, setting up the trial that takes up the second half.
The film's central problem is the characters. Without exception, they are pure good and evil stereotypes.
On one side are sensitive, intelligent, hard-working folk who accept everyone for who they are and support them unquestioningly. Beckett's extended family, led by Joanne Woodward, could have come straight from a Norman Rockwell Saturday Evening Post cover. On the other side are self-satisfied, rich, white, racist heterosexual males who will do anything to keep their boy's club to themselves.
In an escapist thriller, such as Demme's "Silence of the Lambs," such two-dimensional stereotypes are fine. In a serious film that means to comment on contemporary issues, they're a fatal flaw. Curiously, the script also abandons the questions of physical evidence to focus on society's attitudes toward homosexuality.
For comparative purposes, take another look at Sidney Lumet's "The Verdict." It deals with the same individual vs. institution conflict in a courtroom setting, with fully developed characters and a deeply satisfying ending. "Philadelphia" could have been its equal. But perhaps the producers were feeling the pressures of too many immediate concerns. In their efforts to please several different audiences, they lost sight of their real goal: to tell a compelling story about a crime and the people involved with it.
Philadelphia: **
A TriStar release playing at the Salem Valley 8. 119 min. Rated PG-13 for subject matter, strong language.
by CNB