The Crush (1993)

Just perfect...

Good concept, poorly executed.

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

The film that probably got Alicia Silverstone noticed by Hollywood The Crush is a new take on the young teenage being obsessed with an older man. Cary Elwes is alright though he doesn't have much to do but Silverstone is pretty good- It is strange to see her absent lately as she clearly has that star factor going for her. Go see it for her.

The Crush (1993) ** (out of 4) Nick Eliot (Cary Elwes) is a journalist who rents out a guest house and soon becomes friends with the owner's fourteen-year-old daughter Darian (Alicia Silverstone). It doesn't take long for Nick to realize that the young's girls ideas of a friendship are a lot more than what he is willing to give and soon her crush turns into something more dangerous.After the success of FATAL ATTRACTION we were getting all sorts of psycho thrillers. Films like SINGLE WHITE FEMALE and THE HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE were finding audiences so obviously another step was to make on dealing with a LOLITA type of character. THE CRUSH isn't a very original movie and for a thriller it contains no thrills so on that level it's really not that successful, which is too bad because there are a few good things sprinkled throughout the picture.The main reason to watch the movie are for the performances. The actors at least keep you glued into what's going on even though everything is pretty predictable unless you've never seen this type of film before. Elwes is very believable in his role as the writer who finds himself getting too much attention. You've got Silverstone in his screen debut doing a nice job as the troubled woman but there's no question that the screenplay really didn't give her too much to work with. She pulls off the sexy Lolita just fine but the mental issues of the character are never really explored. Jennifer Rubin is good as Elwes' love interest and Kurtwood Smith gets some good scenes as the girl's father.The biggest issue with this movie is that we've seen it countless times before and there's not a single original idea on display here. Even the sexual undertones are kept pretty minimum and instead we're basically seeing a watered down version of LOLITA. The fact that there's not any suspense and hell, there's not even a body count shows that this movie would have been better off on Lifetime instead of in theaters.

Seems strange to review the first film of Alicia, decades after it was released, and now that Alicia is a senior actress of sorts. This film is perhaps the nth of its kind... fatal attraction for a person and its associated problems. Wonky lips Alicia impresses in her debut movie. But the film, in itself, is full of gaps and plot holes. Deserted rooms full of burning candles.. wow. No doubt that Adrienne lit them.. but what about the fire hazard, in a building with wooden walls and floors? And how did the candles remain lit? Surely they would exhaust after sometime? The girlfriend, Amy, gets stung by a bunch of bees, suffocates and almost dies. Adrienne's mischief once again. But the hero kind of forgets to visit her in the hospital. Amy reappears at the end, looking as fit and fine as she was.. no change in her appearance. Good. Should I reveal more plot holes? OK... Adrienne's friend, Cheyenne, is about to be killed, tied to a carousel. Our hero is hell bent on rescuing her. But when she is finally discovered, our hero is more concerned about the welfare of the troublemaker, Adrienne.. poor Cheyenne remains tied. I am not sure how she was rescued at the end.Hmmm.. now I am bored. So let the next viewer report more plot holes. It is a pity that no movie has ever been made on Daisy Duck. Alicia, without any prosthetic makeup, would have been a dead ringer for the role. With perhaps Chris Sarandon as Donald. But forget all that and enjoy Alicia's pout in this debut film. Its her film all the way.

I really enjoyed this movie, especially the DVD version. I'm currently watching it for the second time, and, the nuances of Nick's character are very very interesting. Nick is not, contrary to how his actions could be construed, an absolute idiot... In many ways, particularly in the beginning, Nick seems to allow himself to be manipulated by Adrian, and on some level, he IS physically attracted to her. His character is not quite as obvious as I thought originally. Also, I (unlike some other viewers) didn't find Adrian's character to be completely unbelievable (perhaps because I'm a teenage girl, and I know how evil we can be. *snickers* There's not an age requirement to be a sociopath.) Secondly, Cary Elwes. Admittedly, this character as written, has little depth beyond that of the victim, and although he played the role very well ,(his delivery was what kept the character from being TOTALLY boring)the plot line was simply too obvious... There weren't any plot twists, which kept the film from being truly suspenseful beyond the whole "WTF??? You IDIOT!!! Can't you see she's EVIL?!? Alicia Silverstone's performance was pretty good... but not incredible. I feel that she could have done much more with the role and keeping her character a little more mysterious... As played, it doesn't make much sense that Nick wouldn't have known what was going on earlier.Yeah. Honestly, this plot would have been much more interesting if Nick's character had been less predictable and more flawed, and Adrian had been less obvious. Nonetheless, this is quite an enjoyable flick if for no other reason than to analyze Nick's character and watch Cary Elwes' interesting delivery....Just a small question; Does anyone else think that this is part of what made him decide to start playing the "evil" roles?