Nick of Time (1995)

Simply Perfect

Fresh and Exciting

Excellent but underrated film

As Good As It Gets

Since there are Depp and Walken in leading roles I must say that I expected more from this movie. But it's ok. Slightly above mediocre.7/10

Nick of Time has a rather novel concept of taking place in real time some years before the TV series 24 made this its central conceit.Johnny Depp plays an everyman accountant whose young daughter is kidnapped by villainous Christopher Walken and ordered to kill the Governor of California or else his daughter will die.Walken gives him a gun and a time limit of 90 minutes and it has to be done when the Governor is giving a speech in a hotel.Depp in an unusual role playing a normal guy has to keep his wits about him and try to find help but Walken and his cronies are watching his every move. Depp still manages to unravel a conspiracy.The film may have a preposterous plot, surely there are easier ways to kill the Governor but the film kicks in quickly and director John Badham clearly brings a Hitchcockian sheen to the film. You seem the time motif regularly in the film and an increasingly frantic Depp as time goes on.

This movie is a simple action movie with a little twist. The twist is that it is filmed in real time. That is the time that passes in the movie is exactly the same time that passes in the real world. Thus the movie plays out over about an hour and forty minutes, and the same amount of time passes in the world of the movie.An accountant comes into Los Angeles with his beautiful little daughter after going to his ex-wife's funeral. At the railway station, two people, claiming to be police officers (and I do not doubt that they are police officers) approach him and ask him to come with them. Once they are in the van, they hold his daughter hostage and tell him that unless his kills a specific woman within one and a half hours, his daughter will die. It turns out that this woman is the governess of California.The plot is interesting as it turns out that a lot of people have conspired to kill the governor. The reason is that she broke a number of promises when she was elected, and these promises were to her sponsors. She got into office on a business platform, and once she was there, she took a social justice platform, and her one time allies did not like this. This seems to be central in American politics. This I will look at after I look at the plot itself.Everybody was involved in this, but the accountant was simply a scape goat. This becomes even more evident in the closing scenes where at least three people draw guns. What happens though is that there is an Asian guy with a video camera who keeps his eye on the accountant. This is because the accountant is a scape goat and will take the brunt of the public anger while the real conspirators escape. Yet the accountant is very willing to go through with the deed, but only if he does not get caught - this is seen when he is alone in the room with the sleeping governor - but once she awakens his attitude changes. He will do it to save his daughter, but he knows that if he does it, he will go to gaol - or be executed, which is more likely, and his daughter will probably die anyway.This is interesting that the movie also deals with the battle between the left and the right. The right has always been for less state intervention and the free market economy, while the left has been for social justice. Social justice infringes on the free market and as such the right does not like it. LBJ, one of my favourite presidents, was very much for social justice. This movie represents, in a more violent way, the struggle between the right and the left in America - and the right is very much stronger, as we see here. In 1968, when Nixon was elected, it is said that the left and the New Deal, which is represented by the governor, was finally defeated and that the Americans went for a free market economy. It is interesting that the ones who have the power in the movie are those behind the scenes, while everybody seems to be supporting the governor.This movie was alright, and it is that real-time aspect of it that makes it interesting. It is also a decent action movie, and Johnny Depp is a pretty cool actor - especially how he seems to devote himself to independent movies. He actually seems to play the innocent accountant much better than the punk cop.

The clock is ticking for Johnny Depp in Nick of Time, a twist-filled, race-against-time thriller directed by John Badham. And indeed it is a race, filmed in "real time" so that on screen events unfold minute by nail-biting minute as they would in real life.Christopher Walken, Charles S. Dutton and Courtney Chase co-stars in this film.A stranger pulled into a deadly scheme races against time to save his daughter in this thriller. Gene Watson is an accountant who comes to L.A. with his ten-year-old daughter Lynn to attend a funeral. On the street, Gene and Lynn are pulled aside by Mr. Smith and Ms. Jones, who flash what look like police badges and usher them into a van. Gene soon discovers that he's been kidnapped, and his captors have an unusual demand that is if Gene does not murder Gov. Eleanor Grant within 75 minutes, his daughter will be killed. Gene now has just an hour and a quarter to tip off the authorities, spare Gov. Grant, and find out what Smith and Jones are trying to do, along with saving his daughter's life. He finds a much-needed ally in one-legged shoe-shine man Huey. This is a fast and furious 90 minutes that doesn't waste a second.Also,it is an exciting albeit illogical tale of mystery and suspense.Unfortunately,this is an average movie that was saved by the excellent performances of the cast particularly Johnny Depp and Christopher Walken. Aside from that,the plot is clichéd and predictable as well as it has been already seen in many movies before even with "real time" involved in the premise.