NICK OF TIME (1995) **1/2 Pairing Johnny Depp and Christopher Walken would seem like a good idea under just about any circumstances. Here we've got a Hitchcockesque everyman suspense mystery twister about assassinating politicians, so the stakes are quite high. John Badham has studied the master well, and presents the mechanical workings of weaponry, labyrinthine sweeps of hotels, and herky-jerky plot twists in an earnest manner that suffers only slightly from the gloss. The problem, and there is one, is that the plot has so many gaping holes that it might have been better to present it in that disjointed manner (through the eyes of someone with mental problems, or under the influence of an intoxicant) that is the refuge of lousy writers, and currently all the rage. There are just too many things that don't ring true for me to ever completely fall into the film. On the other hand, the acting is way too good to ever fall out. Depp's character immediately lacks credibility-I mean, come on!, an accountant nonchalently tackling street toughs in the train station?! I've never seen one do anything vaguely like that anywhere, even among themselves, there's a reason that they become accountants. On the other hand, Depp is Depp, and he lends credibility to numerous scenes that are, once you think about it, nearly as absurd. Walken has more sense of the script problems, and occasionally lurches over the edge into a goof that lets you know that he understands what's up, even if Badham doesn't. For all that, it suggestively settles into being a fascinating, and accurate however allegedly fictional, snapshot into a moment in time in California politics. Patrick Sheane Duncan has obviously read enough conspiracy theory stuff to understand that lone nuts don't pull off assassinations without inside help, that politics is more about business than issues, and that the highest echelons of business resemble nothing more than an unambiguous jungle of amorality and greed. G. D. Spradlin is absolute perfection as the embodiment of that world, and the rest of the supporting cast (Charles Dutton, Marsha Mason, Gloria Reuben, Roma Maffia) could have played at an even more impressive level if they'd been given the chance.
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