Just to reiterate what I said a while ago in a couple reviews: I love Clint Eastwood, very, very much. I find him to be an incredibly talented man and many of his movies are among my favorites. Also, I feel like as he got older his movies got better. One of these such movies, "In the Line of Fire,"released in 1993 and directed by Wolfgang Petersen follows along with my previous statement. Clint Eastwood is joined on the big screen with the likes of John Malkovich and Rene Russo. Clint Eastwood is Frank Horrigan, a secret service agent. He has been protecting presidents for decades and actually was quite near John F. Kennedy when he was shot, but did not react as he definitely should have. 30 years later he is making darn certain that that never happens again, while he's on duty. This time around he needs to protect the president of the United States from a psychotic assassin, Mitch Leary, played brilliantly by John Malkovich. Mitch starts out calling Frank, telling him about his proposed assassination of the president, and things escalate. Rene Russo plays Lilly Raines, co-worker and naturally the woman of Clint Eastwood's affection...because most female leads fall for him eventually. This movie is just all around a great movie and somewhere on my list of favorites. Clint Eastwood as always is a force not to be reckoned with. True, many of his characters he plays in movies are quite similar, but he being Clint Eastwood can do that, because he is wonderful at it. So naturally he makes a great lead for this thriller. He was surprising spry at 62 years old. He also gets some great, funny lines in the movie, including the final line of the movie, which is random and great, simultaneously. But, the whole entire show is stolen whenever John Malkovich is on the screen. He was incredible in his role of Mitch Leary. The character was so psychotic, sick and twisted, among other adjectives and John Malkovich made every line intensely believable and worked nicely against Clint Eastwood's character. John Malkovich was nominated for Best Supporting Actor, and probably should have one. But, on Oscar night that year Tommy Lee Jones walked away with the award for "The Fugitive"...in case anyone was wondering about that one. "In the Line of Fire" was also well pace and generally exceptionally entertaining...and you're intelligence isn't being insulted while watching it. Everything was leading up to an intense climax. I love musical scores in movies so I will briefly and slightly randomly mention that it definitely added to the intensity of scenes in the movie and fit nicely overall. Basically, just a well put together thriller. So yes, I highly recommend this movie. If you don't like Clint Eastwood, than that is kind of irrelevant and you need to fix that.
-Joseph Sbrilli
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