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By ELVIS MITCHELL
s an actor, Ben Affleck often suggests one of the Kennedys playing Clark Kent: he wants to keep his light under a bushel, but he's not quite up
to it. He looks as if he has never missed a party or a night's sleep.
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Eike Schroter/Dimension Films
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Ben Affleck in "Reindeer Games."
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He's game, though, and his slight dislocation works to the advantage of "Reindeer Games," the newest wheel-within-a-wheel script from Ehren Kruger ("Scream 3," "Arlington Road"). As directed
by John Frankenheimer, the movie (which has the best title of the year) is a lot of fun until it becomes a Xerox of a blueprint for a hit.
Set in the bleak winter wonderland of Michigan in December, "Reindeer Games" has a metallic grimness. Frankenheimer and his cinematographer, Alan Caso, have given the scenario the distorted sheen of snow reflected
on the chrome bumper of a Plymouth.
A protagonist with the well-fed good looks and dimpled chin of a superhero is just what's called for here, and Affleck, who looks as if he was drawn by the comics artist John Romita, fits the bill. He plays Rudy, serving
out the last days of a prison stretch and looking forward to going home and tasting a holiday dinner.
"Hot chocolate," he tells his cellmate, Nick (James Frain), ticking off a few of his favorite things, "and pecan pie."
Nick's appetites run more toward Ashley (Charlize Theron), the woman he has been corresponding with. But a minor disagreement between Rudy and another convict, who settles arguments with a shiv instead of a well-placed
phrase, leads to a fight that ends with Nick's death.
After all, poor Nick has sacrificial lamb written all over him. (A nice guy named Nick dying during the holidays is a particularly cruel swipe at the season, as are the gray skies the picture is swathed in.) Whenever a
con has too much to live for in B-pictures, one imagines that even the other actors start a pool on how long he'll survive. It's the equivalent of the African-American sidekick in cop movies.
After he gets out, Rudy pretends to be Nick so that he can spend time with Ashley. That's when things get nutty. (Rudy can pass because Nick never sent her a photo, so she has no idea what he looks like.)
Ashley's brother Gabriel (Gary Sinise) wants to use Nick's criminal expertise to rob a casino on an Indian reservation. But Rudy doesn't have the kind of know-how for the job that Gabriel and his grungy pack
of thugs need. Rudy becomes a lowlife Scheherazade, spinning tales to keep himself from the business end of Gabriel's automatic. He's sympathetic because he does the wrong things for the right reasons.
With its Michigan locale, small-time criminals with eyes bigger than their heads, smudged loyalties and plot shifts as deep as the snow drifts, "Reindeer Games" plays like a low-key tribute to the tangled verve
of Elmore Leonard's crime novels. Like Leonard's work, the film is stocked with hoods who love crime and have a baroque taste for violence.
"Reindeer Games" comes closer to Leonard's businesslike toughness than Frankenheimer's adaptation of the author's "52 Pick-Up." Gabriel, with his trailer-trash hair extensions, lives to
do damage, as does the hilariously volatile Merlin (the talented Clarence Williams III, a Frankenheimer repertory member who has come a long way from the anguished and helpful Linc of "The Mod Squad").
The seamy kick of one double cross after another keeps "Reindeer Games" in motion. Narratively, the movie is similar to a casino game: you're not sure where you are and the house has the advantage.
Kruger's knack for a laugh line under pressure is a very pleasant instinct; the wisecracks compensate for characterization. His dexterity with tension and humor borders on the facile. The holiday setting allows for
the sportive use of Christmas songs; in a sex scene, Dean Martin's oiled and lewd slurring of "Let It Snow" plays on the soundtrack.
There's no glibness in Frankenheimer's work to balance the script's cheekiness. He's probably better at using cars and trucks in an action picture than any other director and the wide-screen compositions
magnify the thoughtfulness behind his choices.
Although Rudy is perpetually in a state of bruised confusion, the director's ruthless precision keeps "Reindeer Games" on track. It keeps its footing on the ice.
Frankenheimer has an entertaining bent for swift, scary violence with 1960s creaks and reverbs on the soundtracks for an old school reference point; this movie could have been directed by Gabriel.
Younger directors who have absorbed his filmmaking approach, like Michael Bay, are all flamboyant gesture. Frankenheimer's masculine professionalism -- his thrillers are hard-boiled and businesslike -- is a form of
action-movie savior faire.
It's not just his sharpshooter's eye for detail that keeps "Reindeer Games" rolling. The vividness of the expert cast makes the movie feel lived-in. Theron seems naked even when she's bundled in
her shiny thermal jacket. Danny Trejo makes a mark as the crew member who keeps up with business trends, although Sinise, with his newly buffed torso, is most impressive.
In its brief running time -- the movie is staged like a pit stop -- "Reindeer Games" goes from being fun to being laughable. The last section has everything but Ernst Stavro Blofeld stroking a cat and telling
James Bond why he has kept him alive. The needlessly complicated mechanism is a body blow to the breakneck wiliness that has come before. Kruger seems dangerously close to using up all the arrows in his quiver, or bats
in his belfry, or whatever metaphor you'd find appropriate.
Until it derails itself in its final 10 minutes, "Reindeer Games" is lean and atmospheric, smart enough not to telegraph its freakish glee in its coldhearted take on the holidays: Santa Corpse is coming to town.
PRODUCTION NOTES
'REINDEER GAMES'
Directed by John Frankenheimer; written by Ehren Kruger; director of photography, Alan Caso; edited by Tony Gibbs and Michael Kahn; music by Alan Silvestri; production designer, Barbara Dunphy; produced by Marty Katz, Bob
Weinstein and Chris Moore; released by Dimension Films. Running time: 99 minutes.
With: Ben Affleck (Rudy), Gary Sinise (Gabriel), Charlize Theron (Ashley), Dennis Farina (Jack Bangs), James Frain (Nick), Danny Trejo (Jumpy), Donal Logue (Pug) and Clarence Williams III (Merlin).
'Reindeer Games' is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). It includes violence, nudity and profanity best suited to thugs.
