Poseidon-3 Review of The Holcroft Covenant

The Holcroft Covenant (1985)

Chintzy, murky mystery thriller with marginal performances.

[7 January 2009]

A sprawling and lengthy Robert Ludlum novel was filtered down into this two-hour adaptation. Caine plays a foreign-born American (something that is repeated throughout in order to explain his accent!) architect who discovers that he has been placed in charge of a couple of billion dollars, set aside by his late Nazi father and two other officers, as a way of making latter day reparations to the Jewish family decimated by the Holocaust. In order to activate the funds, he must track down the sons of the other two men who were part of the covenant and gather them at the Swiss bank where they will sign their names and release the money. Caine has barely been informed of the situation before assassins have begun trying to kill him and when they fail in their attempts, his mother Palmer starts to feel the heat as well. He meets up with various mysterious types such as Munch and Hepton as he tries to unravel what's happening. Caine teams up with Andrews, one of the sons, and Andrews' sister Tennant and they seek out the third child, with danger lurking at practically every turn. Eventually, Caine discovers that, not only can he not be sure of whom to trust, but also that the money may not even have been intended for the purpose specified! Caine is, of course, miscast in a role intended for James Caan, but he makes the best of it. He had played in many espionage and spy films during his career. One of his strongest scenes occurs at the very end as he is reacting to an occurrence. Tennant gives a typically bland and uninvolving performance with only an occasional kink in the storyline to keep her from practically vanishing. Andrews brings a welcome touch of flair to his haughty character. Palmer lends some dignity to her role (her last), though she has to contend with some big hair and some even bigger eyeglasses. Though there is a certain degree of interest in the premise and some of the action sequences are captivating, overall this is a sub-par film. It has a fairly tacky look to it, despite the location shooting and it's overlaid with an overbearing and dated-sounding synthesized score. Attempts to inject sex into the story only come off as desperate (though the one big "shocker" was indeed contained in the novel, albeit in a slightly different context than what's shown here.) Beyond that, the plot, as distilled from the larger novel, makes precious little sense and relies on contrivance and an unbelievable amount of convenient globe-trotting. It's disheartening to hear director Frankenheimer, the man behind "The Birdman of Alcatraz," "The Manchurian Candidate" and "The Train" among others, singing the praises of this below average movie on the DVD commentary, though it's understandable that he, if anyone, should like it. It's not completely uninteresting. It's just not particularly good.