Writing isn’t as easy as most people believe and people who actually write for the living are always afraid of the moment when the writers’ block could jeopardise their livelihoods. This is the problem faced by the protagonist at the beginning of Her Alibi, 1989 crime comedy directed by Bruce Beresford. Phil Blackwood (played by Tom Selleck) is a prolific author of crime novels who enjoyed huge success but recently had problems delivering anything of value to his agent Sam (played by William Daniels). In desperate search for inspiration he begins frequenting New York City courtrooms and listening to criminal proceedings. During one of those sessions he notices Nina Ionescu (played by Paulina Porizkova), Romanian immigrant accused of stabbing her compatriot to death. Stunned by her beauty and not believing that she could actually kill anyone, he gets an idea to pretend that he was her lover and thus provide her with alibi. The plan works and she is released, but Phil, because of the sceptic police detective Frank Polito (played by James Farentino), asks her to maintain their charade for some time and invites her to his country house in Connecticut. There Phil notices many strange details about Nina, which include her great athletic skill and ability to handle knives which prompts him to ask himself whether she is indeed a murderess. In the meantime, he still falls in love with her, while her is stalked by sinister-looking Romanian government operatives.
Her Alibi was greeted with great enmity by critics, which was followed by Paulina Porizkova getting Razzie nomination for her role. Reputation wasn’t improved by the reported enmity between Selleck and Porizkova on the set, which affected film’s regular promotion. Decent box office, on the other hand, suggests that the film isn’t that bad. Script by Charlie Peters represents not particularly inspired but serviceable combination of slapstick and screwball comedy, with outrageous premise being spiced up by still soon-to-be-ended Cold War. At the time, Soviets, due to Mikhail Gorbachev’s popularity and his liberalising policies of Glasnost and Perestroika, were becoming less and less credible as villains. Thankfully for the producers, Nicolae Ceausescu, leader of Communist Romania, didn’t get the memo and continued with the old repressive ways; only few months before his regime would be brought down in bloody revolution, his goons served this film’s purpose quite nicely. Film also benefited from Porizkova’s real life story of a immigrant from East Bloc country (in her case, Communist Czehoslovakia) being very much like the character she played. As an actress, she did decent job, although it was quite obvious that the casting originally had more to do with her supermodel looks than acting ability. Selleck is also good in his role, providing just enough comic talent to exploit contrast between his macho image and self-deprecating humour (best seen in his voice over reading excrepts from his novel in which superhuman actions of the hero follow more prosaic exploits of the author). Her Alibi also benefits from the very good supporting cast, including some notable names, like character actor Victor Argo and Classic Hollywood veteran Hurd Hatfield in the role of Romanian agents. Film loses much of the energy near the end, with some weak jokes and anti-climactic finale at clowns’ festival that looks too weird for its own good. Thankfully, short running time would make Her Alibi watchable for less demanding viewers.
RATING: 5/10 (++)
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