Rating: 
Summary: Don Johnson comes through on this one.
Review: A funny film noir. See the movie and read the book
Rating:
Summary: Better Than `Basic Instinct`
Review: After Finnishing up MIAMI VICE Don Johnson Took on this great
role showing the audience a differnt and more versatile performance in one Harry Maddoux, a mysterious drifter with a
icy cold meanstreak in him strolls into a small texas town
conns his way into a salesman job for the town`s car dealership
gets himself involved with his boss`s young,insatible wife Named Dolly Henshaw as well as Gloria Harper, the dealership`s secrtary who hides a terrible secret and plan and commits the perfect robbery of the local bank. These chain of events gradulay move at a great pace so the viewer has the time to ingest the endless twists this film has. As with basic instict this film doesn`t just showcase sex and viloence it shows how greed, blackmail and murder can be part of the human nature and sometimes a deep seeded nature that`s hard to control. Harry at the end of the film gets what he derserves his trechous womanizing ways leads him to his own wrong doing and just before the closing credits you Dolly getting what she always wants as both she and maddoux driving out of town. Steamy love Scenes, a suspensful bank robbery, the scene where Harry talks his way out of trouble with the police. The Scene where Harry savagely beats up a man for refusing to stop blackmailing Gloria. A must see
film for fans of this type of film noir that is so good to watch.
Don Johnson did a fantastic, credible job backing him up with
a top notch cast.
Rating:
Summary: People usually rent this movie for a single reason
Review: and that's the sight of Jennifer Connelly naked. She's lovely, certainly. But nobody comments on the pace of the film, which is deathly slow, and makes Stalker look like Tetsuo the Iron Man. I'm guessing most folks just eat up their tapes fast-forwarding (years ago I went hunting through local video stores looking for a copy of Two Moon Junction, but I was informed at every stop that their copy of the movie had died for just this reason). The rewarding moment in the film is really the scene at the waterfall, with Don and Jenny, which is a sort of dream-idyll in the midst of a lot of nonsense. Time finally seems to freeze, or stop, or maybe congeal (wasn't that the point?), and all that menace and so forth that powers the movie is banished. It isn't even an antidote to velocity, as it would be in other films. In the painfully slow, racheting down to death the film seems to enact (is it dying? slowly writhing? poisoned? what? it's noir, after all) stasis is the antidote, a stay of execution. It's thrilling to get a scene like this in such a piece of junk. There's a similar in moment in (of all things) Michael Moorcock's early novel The Twilight Man. All science-fictional hoodoo melts away for one afternoon, and the lovers enjoy a completely authentic, achingly beautiful moment in paradise.
Rating: 
Summary: Five * aren't enough...
Review: Before you die there are a number of things you MUST have done. Seeing this film is one of them. The mood set by Dennis Hopper is incredible, the cast close to perfect and the way the caracters are portrayed here is fenomenal. If you can watch this film without falling in love with Jennifer you are either gay, dead, or female...
Rating:
Summary: A true work of classic film art, Hopper did it right!
Review: Classic Don Johnson, Virginia Madsen cast perfectly in her sultry, southern white trash, vixen role. Dennis Hopper really put this one together down to the perfect lazy southern blues music. This complex but basic good and evil plot leads you down to a riveting and heated climax. The city slicker character(Don)learns a thing or to from this sleepy southern town which he thinks he can wrap around his finger. Jennifer Connelly is the pure, innocent, and beautiful contrasting element among the devious characters in this tumultuos, kinky circle of characters. Great, memorable lines and dialogue between Johnson and Madsen. See it twice for the details you miss the first time. Watch it with friends!
Rating: 
Summary: Strangely dated
Review: Competently told story about a drifter (Johnson) who rolls into a town and is soon juggling his romances with saucy (and married) Madsen and virginal Connelly while just barely keeping clear of the law.When I first saw this movie ten years ago, it had more of an effect on me because I really bought into Johnson's relationship with Connelly, but seeing it more recently the whole thing seems like something out of one of the romance novels that Connelly reads and Johnson makes fun of. The movie feels dated, not to its end-of-80s release date but to an earlier era when potboilers about rough, maverick loners swinging through small Southern towns were more a part of the cultural zeitgeist--say the 50s. I would expect that the novel this is based on was some anonymous, badly written little page turner that a bored housewife might amuse herself with. Of course, badly written little page turners can make pretty good movies, as Hitchcock demonstrated over and over again, and The Hot Spot is good enough to recommend.
Rating:
Summary: Hot Spot
Review: Director Dennis Hopper Kept This Movie On The Tame Side...Don Johnson Is Semicomatose As A Lowlife Who Drifts Into A Small, Nothing To Do Town...He Robs The Local Bank And Gets Involved With Two Women, One Bad (Virgina Madsen), And One Innocent (Jennifer Connelly)...Connelly Plays Her Character Well With Charisma And Charm...Good Acting With A Restrictive Director, This Film Has The Potential To Be A Great Deal More...
Rating:
Summary: Everything good noir should be
Review: Do you like noir? Then you'll absolutely adore Dennis Hopper's 1990 film "The Hot Spot." It's a rare film these days that can capture the essence of the noir style, a style that seemed to disappear for good nearly five decades ago. You would have to go back to a film like "Double Indemnity" to find something comparable to "The Hot Spot." Perhaps only a long time denizen of Hollywood like Hopper could successfully make a movie like this one--after all, his career extends back to the grand days of noir filmmaking. If I remember correctly, he actually made films with central figures of the genre. Still, it's tough to reconcile Hopper the actor with his the idea of him directing this picture. Remember him as the wacked out journalist in the epic "Apocalypse Now" and the wacked out biker in "Easy Rider," two films that are as far from noir as you can get? His manic, and often maniacal, performances onscreen just don't lend themselves to this film's style. Nor, for that matter, does the idea of television staple Don Johnson in the lead role. Yet it all comes together in a masterful movie that I'm ashamed to say I hadn't seen until recently.
One day, a drifter with a past he's not willing to talk about named Harry Madox (Don Johnson) ambles into a small Texas town looking for work. He finds a job immediately at a used car dealership run by George Harshaw (Jerry Hardin), a man plagued by a bad attitude and a bad heart. Madox, however, doesn't seem like the sort of fellow who will put up with a lot of lip. While he gets along with fellow salesman Lon Gulick (Charles Martin Smith), his battles with Harshaw are constant. He also forms a fast connection with another employee, Gloria Harper (Jennifer Connolly), a gorgeous young girl who seems a bit on the shy side. Since the town is so small it comes as no surprise that George's wife Dolly (Virginia Madsen) soon learns about the new face and makes sure to put in an appearance. This woman is everything Gloria Harper isn't, i.e. extroverted, highly charged, extravagant, and never one to mince words. She makes clear in no uncertain terms that she's extremely interested in Harry Madox, a feeling initially reciprocated by Harry since he's the sort of guy who never turns down an opportunity. All of the attention Madox receives from the ladies is sure to lead to great torment down the road.
Opportunities for Harry don't stop with women. He notices that this town has a bank, and that the employees of said bank are volunteer firemen who leave the building unattended whenever a fire breaks out. What's a fellow to do? Why, rig up a device to start a fire and then rob the bank after everyone in town runs down to watch the blaze. There are several problems with the heist: the sheriff (Barry Corbin) immediately suspects the newcomer of the crime, a man nearly dies in the fire, and Dolly Harshaw removes the cloud of suspicion hanging over Madox by providing an alibi for him. This last difficulty puts our man in a bad position. While he wants his relationship with Gloria Harper to proceed, Dolly's actions require Harry to wait at her beck and call. If he doesn't, all Dolly has to do is go to the police and retract her alibi and it's off to jail for Madox. Thrown into all of this is an unsavory character by the name of Frank Sutton (William Sadler). This chap is blackmailing Gloria Harper over some enigmatic past incident, and it's not too long before Madox feels he must take violent action in that direction. What a mess! Before it's all hashed out, a few dead bodies turn up and a few betrayals take place.
"The Hot Spot" is a film that stands up well next to the old noir classics. There's not a bad performance anywhere in the picture. Don Johnson, arguably the biggest question mark in any big screen film, delivers an incredibly nuanced performance as a man with a penchant for getting into trouble no matter where he goes. Virginia Madsen, whose career is littered with B-movies and television films, quickly makes you wonder why she isn't a bigger star after taking the role of Dolly. Hopper seems to know he captured lightening in a bottle by casting her and thus keeps the camera on her for significant periods of time. Jennifer Connolly, well, is Jennifer Connolly. So gorgeous that it hurts your eyes to look at her, it's completely believable that Johnson's character would choose her over Dolly Harshaw any day. Put these memorable characters in the middle of a hot Texas town where sweat seems to fuel hormone swings, and you've got yourself a cracking good movie. The pacing of the film--slow and purposeful--mirrors the currents of life in a small town. And the music! Ultra cool jazz and blues music is the name of the game here. Every element of the film fits together so smoothly that it's stunning this wasn't a big hit at the box office. Perhaps those unfortunate wretches with tiny attention spans couldn't take the languid pace.
Regrettably, perpetual scrooge MGM released this with only a trailer as an extra. I've discovered that MGM discs are a hit or miss proposition. On the one hand, newer films like "Jeepers Creepers 2" contain so many supplements that it takes hours to watch them. On the other hand, great older films like this one often show up in fullscreen ("The Hot Spot" is widescreen, thank goodness) with no commentary tracks or behind the scenes stuff. I can forego a lot of extras, but wouldn't a commentary track with Dennis Hopper fit well with this picture? Sure it would. Anyway, the movie is a winner and is definitely worth watching
Rating:
Summary: Film Noir makes a valient comeback attempt
Review: Don Johnson and Virginia Madison pull every dirty trick in the book in this zesty bad boy meets bad girl story of lust in a town with nothing to do. Throw in a seemingly innocent ingénue to complicate the hate-need-hate relationship between Johnson and Madison and you've got a movie demonstrating just how rotten people can be. However, it's not entirely painful to watch has some good one-liners, and advice for how to scheme, commit murder, mayhem, and other assorted thuggary and get away with it.
Rating:
Summary: Hot Film Noir
Review: Don Johnson is perfect in this very sexy film noir. The two women are both just right for their bad girl / good girl roles. The ending is a shocker as it should be in this type of movie. But the standout is the inspired soundtrack. Most of the score is by Miles Davis and John Lee Hooker together. Miles' cool muted trumpet over the rough guitar of Hooker compliment each other perfectly, an audio reflection of the opposites in the two women characters and in the makeup of Johnson's character. This movie rates up there with Body Heat for modern noir.
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