THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 29, 1996 TAG: 9602290031
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, MOVIE CRITIC
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
MY PHILOSOPHY professor used to drum away on the premise that it is the questions, not the answers, that are most important.
``Before and After'' undoubtedly poses some extremely important questions - about personal integrity, family loyalty and the judicial system. You might even say the film probes at the heart of America's moral values.
On the other hand, its terrific first hour is largely dissipated by a second hour of cop-outs that border on melodrama.
The body of a teenage girl is found off a lonely, snowbound road near a small town in Massachusetts. The immediate suspect is her boyfriend (Edward Furlong), who, apparently on the run, has disappeared.
The boy's parents greet the police's suspicions with decidedly different reactions.
Liam Neeson, the stern, well-to-do father, throws the police out of the house. Finding a bloodstained tire jack, bloody glove and jacket in the boy's car, he impulsively destroys the evidence.
``The worst thing you can be called in this world is someone who didn't stand up for his family,'' he says. Later, he tells his son, ``We'll save your life first. Later, we can worry about your soul.''
His mother, played by the incomparable Meryl Streep, has other thoughts. She assumes her son is innocent and believes destroying any evidence will interfere with finding the real killer. She's willing to take the chance that the truth is on her side by ``doing the right thing.'' Her husband derides her ``weakness.''
Inner struggle is difficult to portray on screen. The trailers and movie ads would have you believe this is another murder-mystery. Ted Tally's script gets a bit muddled, but, to its credit, it tries earnestly to chronicle the effects of such suspicion on the family rather than the event itself.
Streep again turns in a sensitive and carefully modulated performance. Neeson is perfectly cast as the stubborn man who, after acting impulsively, refuses to back up. It is not easy to choose sides.
Furlong, though, is a major mistake. He plays the part with a surly arrogance rather than an ordinary boy threatened with major trouble.
The details of the death are explained by the halfway point, leaving only a rash of anti-climactic courtroom manipulating. Alfred Molina, the melodramatic, gung-ho defense lawyer, represents our worst suspicions about the legal system, even going so far as putting the dead girl's morals on trial.
In the movie's most predictable scene, Streep meets the victim's mother, who accuses her of ``using all your money and hotshot lawyers to try to get him off.''
Surprisingly, the film's two most potentially dramatic moments - the parents' testimony to the grand jury - are played off-screen. We get the details secondhand.
Director Barbet Schroeder is overly serious about his mission. If his film could have maintained the momentum of its first hour, he might have created an American tragedy on the level of ``A Place in the Sun'' or ``Ordinary People,'' films in which consequences determine trauma.
Even with its flaws, ``Before and After'' deserves considerable credit for daring to try drama on such an intense and personal level. ILLUSTRATION: MOVIE REVIEW
``Before and After''
Cast: Meryl Streep, Liam Neeson, Edward Furlong, Alfred Molina
Director: Barbet Schroeder
Music: Howard Shore
MPAA rating: PG-13 (mature subject matter, violence)
Mal's rating: 3 stars
Locations: Cinemark, Greenbrier 13, Chesapeake; Circle 4,
Norfolk; Columbus, Lynnhaven Mall, Surf-n-Sand, Virginia Beach
by CNB