Eye for an Eye

Director John Schlesinger takes an hour to get around to the vigilante premise promised by the title and previews of his latest thriller. Eye for an Eye is a much better movie before he does it. [12 Jan 1996, p.10]

A generally effective revenge thriller. [12 Jan 1996, p.3E]

Schlesinger, working from a script by Amanda Silver ( "The Hand that Rocks the Cradle" ) and Rick Jaffa (he produced that film), gives the film a zippy pace and a natural momentum as direct as a hot knife negotiating a butter stick. Schlesinger is also still canny at casting. Read full review

A B movie that somehow won the lottery and got an A-movie cast and director. Read full review

It’s an exercise in mad-as-hell vigilantism. And to reinforce the absurdity of what fury can be unleashed in a woman when a killer smirks, Sally Field — the Not Without My Daughter star herself — plays the ponytailed mom with the itchy trigger finger. Read full review

Well acted, well crafted and might have been a truly searing drama if it weren't so simplistic, pat and predictable. Read full review

What makes this film more than mere visual vigilantism is John Schlesinger, of whom it can be safely asked, what happened? He shows flashes of the old brilliance here -- the talent that made "Midnight Cowboy" so moving and "Marathon Man" such a nail-biter -- in telling this modern horror tale of the court system gone awry. It's unfortunate that after the messy construction of his last film, "The Innocent," he hasn't directed his gifted self toward something with a bit more intelligence. [12 Jan 1996, p.F6]

Call it Death Wish Goes Suburban. Read full review

Eye for an Eye is one of three pictures currently in theaters about parents coping with the deaths of children. Both of the others, The Crossing Guard and Dead Man Walking, are vastly superior, and the latter, a thoughtful examination of some of the same issues that drive this film, makes Eye for an Eye look like puerile rubbish. Despite paying lip service to high ideals, Schlesinger's movie has no moral compass, and is only interested in delivering cheap thrills. And, while there's a place for that in movies, appropriating this particular storyline for such a base intention feels uncomfortably like a defilement. Read full review

Unfortunately, the script by Amanda Silver and Rick Jaffa (a husband-and-wife team who previously collaborated on "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle") eventually throws out all ambiguities and endorses Field's actions, even suggesting that her husband and Mantegna's policeman just aren't committed enough to seek justice...It's a revolting development in a transparently manipulative movie, created by people who clearly know better. [12 Jan 1996]

Eye for an Eye's filmmakers have climbed on some high horse of social commentary, pretending this stalk-or-be-stalked suspenser is a meaningful drama about a wayward justice system where the rights of criminals supersede the rights of victims and their families. But what about the rights of moviegoers? We deserve better than this. [12 Jan 1996, p.05]

Essentially "Death Wish" in pantyhose. Like that earlier inflammatory fable, this blatant button-pusher plays upon our most primal emotions as well as the increasing disdain for the criminal justice system. It's a crude but effective promotion for frontier-style vigilantism. Read full review

Movies like Eye for an Eye cheapen our character by encouraging us to indulge simplistic emotions - to react instead of analyzing. It provides a one-in-a-million situation and tries to teach us a lesson from it; thoughtful audience members will be aware they're not being treated fairly. This is filmmaking at the level of three-card monte. If you don't believe me, see "Dead Man Walking." Read full review

Eye For an Eye is a Charles Bronson revenge flick with Sally Field in the Bronson role: It's Death Wish Gidget , and it's ridiculous. [12 Jan 1996, p.6G]

Directed by John Schlesinger, Eye for an Eye is a repellent, cynical piece of work a movie that exploits violence while pretending to deplore it. [12 Jan 1996, p.33]

Eye for an Eye reaches campy zenith when Field, newly energized - dare I say empowered? - by her martial arts and weaponry skills, turns into a tigress in bed, frightening her husband. [12 Jan 1996, p.28]

We can all share frustration with a process that frees the Doobs of the world, but this heavy-handed movie won't provide catharsis. The filmmakers treat subtlety as a sin - unless Schlesinger thinks he's being subtle by showing us O.J. prosecutor Marcia Clark for only a couple of seconds on a TV screen. [12 Jan 1996, p.4E]

But if the idea of tiny, little Sally Field in the Charles Bronson part strikes you as a bit silly, that's only the beginning of the idiocies. [12 Jan 1996]

His characters and his situations all ring false, and his movie just seems painful and pointless. [12 Jan 1996]

This suspense drama, which stars Sally Field, Kiefer Sutherland and Joe Mantegna, tries desperately to press your vigilante buttons. But its manipulative agenda is so transparent, you don't know whether to take exception or laugh it off. Read full review

It’s early in the new year, but I doubt that 1996 will produce a film more unthinkingly insidious than Eye for an Eye. Read full review

[A] really awful, hysterical thriller...If you thought Schlesinger’s Pacific Heights was egregious, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Read full review

This rabidly bad revenge movie is directed by John Schlesinger, who made "Midnight Cowboy," "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" and "Billy Liar" -- and unfortunately more to the point here, "Honky Tonk Freeway" and "Pacific Heights." Never in his varied career has Mr. Schlesinger made a film as mean-spirited and empty as this. The sole purpose of "Eye for an Eye" is to excite blood lust from the audience after the killer, played by Kiefer Sutherland as a walking smirk, slips through the hands of justice because of the improper handling of a sperm sample. Mr. Schlesinger shamelessly underscores this outrage by including a glimpse of the O. J. Simpson trial. Read full review