In the Line of Fire

The professional history of Frank Harrigan who failed to save Kennedy in '63 when acting as a bodyguard and of Mitch Leary, a recently sacked and embittered CIA assassin threatens to take on far-reaching consequences both politically and in their personal lives as Leary uses the secret service agent as a pawn to satisfy his acrimony towards the Government and his own psychotic tendencies.

Clint Eastwood slips effortlessly into the role of "burnt-out secret-service guy who likes jazz and plays the piano", as his agent puts it to him. Although too old to play Dirty Harry, audience familiarity with Eastwood is not a distraction in this new role, in fact, the man making a last bid for success in his autumnal years is a part that suits him a little too well, yet he carries it off with the well turned charm and style that we have grown to love, and wins the heart of colleague Lily Raines, a good albeit unlikely catch at 63.

If Clint was the obvious choice to play Harrigan, then who else but John Malkovich could have played the psycho assassin of aloof intelligence? The only wonder is why it takes Eastwood so long to seek him out. Malkovich shows remarkable restraint in not hamming up the role for which it is demanded he assumes a variety of guises from bum to businessman. He performs tasks of sickening brutality with unerringly cold calculation. He plays suitably close to the line so that his pursuer is kept hot on his tail yet a step behind at every turn as the film's pace gathers momentum.

The two characters rarely meet until the climax of the film but an intense relationship is built up between them the phone (showing admirable direction from Petersen,) as both feed off each others' every word drawing penetrating psychological profiles off the other. In The Line of Fire is a top notch thriller which shows the wit of the mind and integrity of spirit as the tools in the battle between revenge and redemption.

Review by Cordelia Stephens
Taken from EUFS Programme 1994-95