Derailed

One of my friends remarked that while he was watching Derailed, he just couldn’t shake the feeling that he had seen this movie before. I didn’t get the same sensation during my viewing, but since the main elements of Derailed aren’t all that groundbreaking, anyone who sees movies on a consistent basis might feel like they’re rehashing old material. Apparently, despite the fact that I see movies, one might say, all the damn time, I’m still an absurdly easy target for Hollywood to exploit.

Charlie Schine (Clive “Johnny I’m-evidently-too-good-for-the-role-of-James-Bond” Owen) is having a pseudo mid-life crisis. Disenchanted with his wife, Deanna (Melissa George), and weary of his constant financial and emotional struggle in caring for a daughter with Type I diabetes, he has started to yearn for a change. He’s a decent guy, but when he meets a beautiful young vixen on the train one day, he allows himself to indulge in some relatively harmless temptation in the form of verbal banter. Lucinda Harris (Jennifer Aniston), it turns out, is also married, but to a husband whom she never sees due to his demanding market-based executive existence. Both Charles and Lucinda are somewhat hesitant to continue their daily flirtation, but the mutual attraction is strong enough that they ignore their ethical misgivings about the situation and instead allow it to escalate. They finally forgo all pretenses and check in to a moderately seedy hotel, but before they can fully violate their wedding vows, they are interrupted by a brutal mugger. After he steals their money, beats Charlie into semi-unconsciousness, and then horrifically rapes Lucinda, the two would-be lovers discuss their options. Neither really wants to go to the police out of fear of revealing their purpose at the hotel, so they decide to part ways and attempt to move on with their lives.

Alas, the vile mugger, Phillipe Laroche (Vincent Cassel, perhaps a distant relation to alien and NBA star, Sam Cassell), calls Charlie and heartlessly demands $20,000. Lucinda offers Charlie several thousand dollars and begs him not to go to the police, saying that her husband would take away her daughter if he ever found out about their near affair. Charlie, being the nice guy that he is and feeling immensely guilty for her suffering, refuses her money but acquiesces to her request for silence by paying Laroche the money. Several weeks later Charlie has returned to his normal state of affairs, when he receives yet another phone call and threat from Laroche, this time demanding $100,000. Laroche simply refuses to leave Charlie alone, even going so far as to visit Charlie’s house and have a pleasant coffee break with his wife. Charlie and Lucinda start to make some rather poor decisions in their attempts to rid themselves of Laroche, which leads to a rather surprising twist. For me, anyway.

I definitely liked Derailed, but I am also what one might classify as a gullible viewer. I didn’t like some of the characters’ decisions in dealing with the situations presented to them, but for the most part it was fairly plausible. The acting was not surprisingly excellent, even and especially from the two rappers who starred in the film, Xzibit and RZA—although Xzibit’s role wasn’t necessarily all that challenging. The story is thrilling and relatively logical, but probably less so for the more critical viewer. Therefore, I recommend this movie to anyone who has little difficulty in accepting what is presented on the screen, but those of you with a more fastidious eye might find yourselves a little annoyed with Derailed.