Tick Tock (2000)

Fantastic!

Excellent but underrated film

Absolutely Fantastic

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

***SPOILERS*** Very much like Stanley Kbrick's 1956 crime thriller "The Killing" the made for TV flick "Tic Tock" or "A friendship to kill for" uses the movie technique of flashbacks in real time to reconstruct it's very complicated plot making it easy for its audience to follow it.In the film lesbian lovers Rachal & Carla, Megan Ward & Kristin Minter,plan to knock off Rachel's rich husband Holden Avery, David Dukes, who's known in these parts, the West Coast, of the country as the potato king. It's Holden who supplies most of the restaurants in California Oregon and Washington state with top grade Idaho potatoes that he personally inspects for any defects to make sure that their top grade.Holden in fact is suspicious that his wife Rachel is cheating on him and had employed private detective Clay Fairfield, John Ratzenberger, to check her out. Fairfield comes up with this urban cowboy type Travis Brewer, Linden Ashby, who's been trying to get friendly with her since he introduced herself to Raciel at a local bar. As we soon find out Travis is part of the plan that the manipulating Carla, in fact he's her secret lover, is using both Rachel & Travis to not only knock off Holden but have Travis, a two time loser already, end up taking the rap for it! Everything works like clockwork with Holden getting his skull smashed in by Carla with Travis who was told to go to Holden's mansion for his payoff money, in him blackmailing Rachael, being spotted by PI Fairfield where he'd end being the prime suspect in Holden's murder! As things soon turned out Holden's daughter Anne, Hedy Burress, showed up unexpectedly at the Holden Mansion complicating things for the two murderesses! What's even more disturbing for Rachel & Carla is that Travis, in finding Holden's body, had cleaned up the bloody mess hiding Holden's battered and bloodied corpes in the woods thus taking him out of being a suspect in his murder!****SPOILERS**** With their perfect crime unraveling both Rachel and Clara start to unravel themselves in trying to cover it up! With Travis,the designated fall guy, being the only one who can finger the girls in Holden's murder he's then set up to be murdered himself by Carla & Rachel only to end up , by the skin of his teeth, getting away. It's when Travis runs out of luck and is about to be gunned down by Rachel who had earlier murdered her partner in crime Carla, for cheating on her with him, that he ends up not only getting away in a sense but taking his potential murderer,Rachel, along with him! In a most unusual both together and unexpected way!

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS MILD SPOILERS TOWARDS THE END, BUT NOTHING CONCRETE AND DOES NOT SPOILER REALLY ANYTHING..I just watched this film, called 'A Friendship to Die For' on Lifetime and was pleasantly surprised by what an enjoyable thriller it was and the way the director told the story, constantly flashing back in time to view the scenario from a different characters' perspective was creative. There were many twists in this film and it did not follow a formulaic thriller plot which was refreshing. Just when you thought you knew what was going to happen, there would be a twist and then a flashback to show the audience how exactly that twist came to happen.The story is basically about a murder plot that goes wrong and the antics that happen during the night to try and fix the crime, only things keep going wrong, things keep trying to be corrected and before the killer(s) know it, they are in over their heads.My one gripe was the ongoing theme to see who could incriminate themselves more with DNA/Fingerprint evidence. The actual murder is committed in the nude telling the audience that said killer(s) is conscious of this type of thing yet once things start going wrong, DNA/Fingerprints don't really seem to be on the killer(s) mind(s) as he/she/they go from object to object touching at will and throw objects like a blood soaked dead body into a car trunk for transportation without even considering the DNA that will be left behind. It became comical at times which I don't really know if it that is a good or bad thing.Also.. why, once the dead body went MIA, Megan Ward's character of Rachel didn't just call 911 and act like he was missing is beyond me. I guess they wouldn't have had a movie then. Ha.. since had she done that, she probably would have been home free since she had an alibi and the PI man had seen the cowboy's car at the home making him suspect number 1. Plus, the dead body would have eventually been found... Just a thought. It's almost certain that the cowboy would have gone down for the murder..but again, then we wouldn't have a movie. :)

I flicked on to this movie at about 2 a.m. this morning.I read the brief overview and thought it warranted closer attention. The reviewer had used the phrase 'gripping thriller'.The only regret I have about this movie is that is was shown so late at night / early in the morning. Definitely a 9 p.m. showing.The clock-thing puzzled me but I realized that this was an innovative way of showing a scene from a different person's perspective.Lots of nice touches and details punctuate the story, especially the final scene.I won't try to categorize it - it falls into a miscellaneous category of movie. It's not a Citizen Kane, but it's definitely not a B-Movie either.

I have to accept that this movie got my attention because Megan Ward was in it. Otherwise, I am sure I would not watch it. Luckily, I did, and let me tell you what I found.From the beginning to the end, the movie maintains the suspense by revealing the plot gradually from different characters' standpoints. Therefore, you do not have the whole history until the director goes back in time and presents what happened from other character's viewpoint, which is necessary to be known to explain the story. Additionally, characters' motives are not so clear, giving the movie another conflict factor. I liked this way of developing the story as well as some transitions from one scene to another using a common object to both.Respect to the story itself, it begins with M. Ward (Rachel) and D. Dukes (Holden) having sex. After that, he tells her he will be out for a couple of days to visit her daughter Anne (H. Burress) and he goes to take a shower. Then, Rachel calls her friend Carla (K. Minter) and they talk about doing something together; but Rachel is not sure. Later, Rachel drops Holden at the airport where he (knowing she talked with Carla) tells her to not spend time with Carla because she is a bad influence. From there, the story complicates when Rachel and Carla meet at a bar and casually get in touch with Travis (L. Ashby.)Talking about the negatives, cast performance is not the best (but I expect that) and I did not like how the writer justified certain characters' conducts, although I believe it is probably me. Overall, I give this movie a solid six (6) using IMDB's user ratings as scale.