“Are you
telling me you can speak six languages and fly a jetliner but you don’t know
how to file a tax return?...It’s never come up?...Does this have to happen
right now?...No, that’s a W-2. WW2 the
Second World War.”
In the music business common is the
“one-hit wonder”, in film the common hit is usually the first film, when an
writer/director really has had something to say and knows that they may not get
a chance to say anything ever again on film.
Such is the case of Jake Kasdan’s “Zero Effect”. This little gem from 1998 stars Ryan O’Neal,
Ben Stiller, and Bill Pullman as the mysterious Daryl Zero, a private detective
who is the world’s greatest observer/detective, but is the worst at
communicating with anyone in his personal life.
The story is
a slant on a typical old fashioned detective yarn, with a modern day Sherlock
Holmes complete with the twists and turns of ‘not everything is as it seems’
with secrets behind O’Neal’s character Gregory Stark. The man loses his keys and needs Daryl Zero
to find them, all the while Zero’s handler Arlo played by Stiller is having
doubts about his commitment to his eccentric employer.
This is a
fantastic film with a stellar performance by Pullman as the smooth, cunning
detective while on the job and a nutcase while off. The script is sharp and solid and has great
narration by Pullman, who claims to be writing a book on the subject of his
methods. It’s littered with tons of
great lines spread throughout the piece: “A person can’t escape their
nature.” “What doesn’t kill you, defines
you.” And one of my favorites: “I’ll
shoot you. Really, I will. I have a gun and everything.” It’s a lot of fun and has complete
re-watchability. You get all the idiosyncrasies of the Zero character and how
he goes through life with his uncanny abilities that may be a handicap more
than a gift.
Unfortunately
this first film is also the best by Kasdan, and maybe I was out of line with
the whole one-hit wonder thing, his last few films have had some good moments,
like a bad album has some good songs. I
take it back it’s exactly like a one-hit wonder. Here’s hoping he’s got another great one in
him, until then, check out “Zero Effect”.
--Robert L. Castillo
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