A LESSON TO REMEMBER..., 11 Nov 2002

By	Lawyeraau (Balmoral Castle) - See all my reviews

They hook up with a handsome, young Australian named Nick Parks (Daniel Lapaine), who engages their confidence and with whom they briefly end up hanging out. Alice and Darlene find themselves competing for his interest. He then invites them to accompany him for a weekend in Hong Kong and, ultimately, both agree. While at the airport to board their flight to Hong Kong, they suddenly discover themselves under arrest, as one of their backpacks is found to contain a large cache of drugs, much to their collective surprise.

The girls then begin a journey through the Tibetan criminal justice system, which appears to be a corrupt one and especially harsh on the drug trafficking of which they are accused. Alice, the more savvy one, declines to sign anything, while Darlene, the more naive of the two, signs a statement written in Thai that she believes to be a transcript of her own words, only later to find that she has signed a complete confession. Even after obtaining legal representation from an expatriate attorney named Yankee Hank Green (Bill Pullman), they still end up being sentenced to a very long prison term. This is where the movie starts focusing on what it is really all about, their friendship.

Excellent performances are given by Claire Danes and Kate Beckinsale, as well as Bill Pullman. While Claire Danes give her somewhat hard edged character a certain vulnerability, somehow the viewer knows that she could probably do the time to which she is sentenced while standing on her head. Kate Beckinsale imbues her her character with a fragility that lets the viewer know that if she stays in that Tibetan prison for very long, she will be a goner.

While the ending comes as somewhat of a surprise, it is somehow fitting. Yet, at the same time it is puzzling, as it is almost as if there were an atonement involved, but the viewer is left guessing as for what. The film is a compelling one, but in the final analysis falls somewhat short of its mark, with questions unanswered and motives left open to speculation. Still, the film manages to entertain, notwithstanding these shortcomings.

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