Who is guilty in brokedown palace

Brokedown Palace Who wouldn't have some curiosity and tension about two pretty young women played by pretty young actresses, anyway , trapped in a Thai prison system for drug smuggling? But boy is this a clunky construction for a movie. First of all, the women are stupid.

They admit to being stupid, but they are selfish and frivolous and you really couldn't care less if they went to jail. On the other hand, you can picture being in a foreign country and losing track of things a little and getting victimized and so you do, after all, get involved and hope for justice. There is sometimes a tense progression of increasingly discouraging events, and the prison system is a tough place.

And the sets and filming are really great. If only the writing was remotely convincing and smart. It's not. Even the direction is painful, emphasizing not the facts or some sense of possible realism, but an armchair version of what this kind of scenario might mean to two relatively innocent girls is just a little embarrassing.

The director Jonathan Kaplan is the same one who missed a huge opportunity with some amazing material filming In Cold Blood, and he is, understandably, most known for television, which takes a different kind of sensibility. And it's also very slow, taking a few turns or progressions and stretching a two hour movie out of it. It's a tough ride if you take it at face value.

And it's a shame, because there is a Midnight Express hidden in here somewhere. There are some really gorgeous moments, aside from the travelogue stuff, and I think Claire Danes, at least, is a good actress. Just an example of how many elements it takes to align and get a great movie. Warning: Spoilers. The above average drama presents a pair of great acting performances and a script that allows a multitude and various levels of emotional outlets.

The twists and turns in this movie are subtle and not overly dramatic, but sufficient to make this substantive movie a superior production. The stereotypical elements are softened, the hard clash of uncertainty, friendship, loyalty, deception are well portrayed in this movie. Brokedown Palace offers a strong statement and experience in a different country and a great examination of the test of the bonds of friendship or betrayal.

The one major flaw in the movie is a legal scene weakness in the appeal scene that avoided a strong defense line of questioning and cross-examination, Bill Pullman's character so some reason likely the scriptwriter failed to incorporate it and defuse it. Eight out of Ten Stars.

Did she or didn't she? Most excellent film showing why nobody should ever go to a foreign country and take up with a stranger. Spellbinding throughout with some wondrous performances by an enthusiastic cast: some of the best that I've seen in a while. I watched this movie 11 years ago in company with my best female friend.

I got my judgment teeth pulled out so I didn't feel very good. I ended up liking it big time. It's a hard watch if you take in account that it deals with friendship, unwanted betrayal, power, money, drug traffic, and the extreme hard situation that deals with living in a foreign jail. The acting is on it's prime level. Two of the women that I lust the most star and that's a good thing.

Claire Danes is as cute and charming as always while Kate Beckinsale is extremely hot and delivers a fine performance. Bill Pullman is also great and demonstrates his histrionic qualities. There are many plot twists to dig from and make it an interesting visual experience. Plus it shows the difficult times at Thailand. This is an underrated movie. Not many films like this one have come up in recent history. It should make you reflex about many things It succeeds on many levels, but it also fails on many levels.

While the film is totally unoriginal HEAVY emphasis on 'unoriginal' , it is very well acted and directed, even if nearly every aspect of the story itself has very recently been seen in almost exactly the same way. Brokedown Palace is literally a remake of the stunningly powerful film Return To Paradise, which starred Vince Vaughn and Joaquin Pheonix, and which presented almost exactly the same story, except that the main characters were male and there were three of them instead of two. Alice and Darlene Claire Danes and Kate Beckinsale, respectively take a trip to Thailand together just after high school, to celebrate their lifelong friendship that is about to be separated by college.

Once there, they almost immediately encounter a charming Australian guy who wines and dines both of them, sparking intense jealousy, and coerces them to accompany him to Hong Kong. While it's not hard to believe that, in their rush to get to the airport on time, Alice did not notice the extra weight of the narcotics that Nick the charming Australian guy planted in her pack, it was kind of a big risk that he took, assuming that they would be too rushed to notice that much extra weight in their luggage.

One of the main problems with the film is that Alice and Darlene were so reckless when they first got to Thailand. Sure, this establishes the fact that they just didn't know better, hence increasing the emotion caused by their later misfortune, but some of it was just too much. Never mind the fact that they are in a foreign and significantly more dangerous country - pulling some moronic stunt like that will get you in big trouble ANYwhere.

Another unnecessary element was the ordeal with Darlene's father later in the film. He shows up at the prison in Thailand and soothingly convinces Darlene that everything is going to be okay, that he'll make sure everything is fixed and she gets home safely and out of that damn prison. Then when Alice comes out, he basically tells her that he never trusted her and she can rot in that prison thousands of miles away from anything she knows, for all he cares.

Why is it that this guy goes immediately from being a loving and caring father to an absolute worthless bastard? I don't care how many times she got paint on his couch or got his daughter in trouble or whatever, that is no reason to leave her in a strange prison on the other side of the planet.

That guy was a total dick, and nothing ever really even came of that scene. The legal ordeal that the girls went through involving the seedy lawyer played by Bill Pullman was also very interesting, but also grossly unoriginal. Alice and Darlene suffer the exact same troubles that faced the characters in Return To Paradise, with exactly the same result.

While this was an entertaining and admittedly an intensely emotional film, without the quality performances Brokedown Palace would be little more than an instructional video about what not to do when on vacation in Thailand. The ending leaves you wondering if she ever really does get out of that prison, but we'll never know, because who the hell would want to watch a sequel to a film like this?

The film left so many loose ends that it almost cancelled out all of the things that it achieved. We know that Darlene goes home, and obviously she'll try to get Alice out, but they sure didn't have much luck up to that point.

We only get a vague idea of what happens to Nick, and the film ends with Alice still in the prison, saying that she knows she did the right thing and that she remains hopeful that Darlene will fight for her until she gets released, too. Optimists are sure to get a good thrill out of this, but every single event in the entire film after they get thrown into prison suggests that Alice is never going to get out of there, at least not until she's an old woman.

This weak ending although still very emotional, due to the quality acting from Claire takes a lot away from a film that was not that good to begin with. Ambitious prison drama about two best friends, one college-bound, the other a frequent troublemaker, who celebrate their high school graduation by vacationing in Thailand.

Once there, they meet a charming stranger who invites them on an all-expenses paid trip to Hong Kong, but while awaiting their flight at the airport they're busted for heroin smuggling--an offense considered worse than murder by the Thai government. Sentenced to life in prison, they call upon an American lawyer Pullman who knows the Thai justice system but questions the alleged innocence of his two clients.

Has some effective moments, and is carried a long way by the performances of its three leads, but eventually turns overly melodramatic and predictable. You've probably seen this movie before, first when it was called "Midnight Express" and then when it was called "Return to Paradise.

In this case, the perpetrators are two young women Claire Danes and Kate Beckinsale , who tell their folks they're going to Hawaii but instead head to Thailand for a week and a half.

Well, as you can imagine, the idyllic paradise isn't quite all that, and our protagonists spend some time in a nasty, icky women's prison called Brokedown Palace.

Interestingly, an early scene in Thailand has the girls jumping on a bed, screaming because of a cockroach. But as soon as they're arrested, that naive waif-like attitude is gone, and suddenly they're tough as raw beef. The key to this story is whether Danes and Beckinsale can draw you in, get some sympathy from you. Sadly, neither one does this. Both performances are rather one-note; there's hardly any character development in a movie that cries out for it.

In fact, many of the lines are delivered so badly that you almost have to keep yourself from laughing out loud - although surely this is no comedy! Bill Pullman plays a cagey lawyer conveniently married to a Thai who pleads their case. As a crusty, veteran, world-weary, seen-it-all barrister, Pullman does fine work, although you have to question his judgement in some scenes.

All in all, not as compelling as it should have been. Incidentally, the term "Brokedown Palace" comes from a Grateful Dead song of the same name; reportedly, the makers of the movie were Deadheads. At the airport they are busted, unjustly arrested, convicted and sent to prison for 33 years for smuggling heroin in Thailand. The movie, directed by Jonathan Kaplan " Over the Edge ," " The Accused " , plays the material straight, to great effect. There are no sneaky plot tricks or grandstand plays, and the reasoning of a Thai judge, during an appeal hearing, is devastating in its logic.

There is, however, an interesting development at the end, which I will not even hint at, which requires the audience to decide whether something can be believed, and what exactly are the motives behind it.

Claire Danes, clear-eyed and straightforward, plays Alice as just a little more complex than her friend. She comes from a poorer background, has a reputation for getting into trouble and doesn't seem trustworthy to Darlene's dad. Pullman, weighing the pros and cons, dealing with a cynical and unhelpful U. Embassy official Lou Diamond Phillips , has seen cases like this before. The girls should have known not to trust strangers, to be suspicious of a free trip to Hong Kong, to never let their luggage out of the sight of both of them.

Should have. Now they have a lot of time to think about that. Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from until his death in Sideways is on. I'm out I love this movie also. What I couldn't understand was the part where the lawyer grills the rich????

If neither of them were guilty - was that part there to reveal that the rich girl slept with the guy? Every time I see it, I always wish they hadn't taken the guy up on his offer, or that they had never snuck into the pool area. Great movie Has anyone ever seen "Return to Paradise? Everytime this movie is on I get sucked in!! I never want to go to Thailand because of this movie. They leave They try for a swim at a luxury hotel, but then there's some trouble when it's time to pay for their drinks.

They're rescued by a roving software consultant, Nick Parks, an Australian. Nick's a good guy, although he can't decide which girl he's after. He tells the pair that Hong Kong is great, and he's willing to exchange his first class plane ticket for three economy The girls rush to catch their flight out.

At the airport police arrive suddenly. The girls have heroin in their backpack Darlene's father has no luck freeing the girls from prison, even when he looks for help from the local DEA agents. But there's a sleazy lawyer, Hank Green, who may be able to do something, for a price