Absolute Power (1997)

Absolute Power is a film that sees a burglar witness the US President involved in a murder and the attempts by the presidents people to retrieve the evidence that would place the president at the scene of the crime. Eastwood plays Luther Whitney the burglar in question who has an estranged daughter (Laura Linney). The story spends a long time getting to the moment where the president gets involved in the murder but once it does the scene itself is quite tense and impressive.

First of all we are meant to believe that Clint Eastwood is still a burglar at the age he was then (He would have been 67) and there was a bit where he was being chased through the woods which must have been for quite some distance and didn’t seem to be out of breath seemed a little implausible to me. After the murder has been committed the story introduces Whitney’s daughter who the police are trying to use to get Whitney. I wasn’t as bothered by this as it felt like they had the desire just to add something to make the story have a bit more emotional edge which it quite frankly didn’t need.

Clint Eastwood is typically Clint Eastwood and plays the role of Whitney brilliantly. When he not on screen my mind tended to wander a little but when Clint was on screen I found myself enjoying the film. Gene Hackman was brilliant as the President and as someone who is trying to control the secret of what happened that day. He comes across as someone who tries to come across as quite dominate but actually crumbles at the first sign of pressure. Very good performance. Ed Harris tends to play bad guys and its easy to see why. In this he is totally weak and doesn’t come across convincingly as a good person. The previous years movie The Rock shows how good he can be when he is a baddie in this he seems to be uncomfortable as a good guy as he seems to bumble his way through his scenes with Laura Linney.

The thing about Absolute Power is that it’s a perfectly decent movie but lacks the punch that you would expect from a movie starring two of Hollywood’s greatest actors. The film seems quite happy to bumble along and at no point did I feel that it was building up to anything particular. The film moves along and then Gene Hackman is killed and that seems to be the end of it. That said I enjoyed it and it showed why Clint Eastwood is one of my favourite actors and is a great director. When you consider his work one thing that can sadly be said about his films it that there is always something to like.

Rating - 7/10