The Fugitive (1993, PG-13)

Surprisingly enough, the Fugitive was nominated for seven Academy Awards.  It won one of them, or in better terms, Tommy Lee Jones won one of them.  Jones won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in his role as the experienced US Marshall Deputy Sam Gerard.  However, the fact that Jones won that award is quite debatable.  Namely, he went up against Ralph Fiennes for Schindler’s List and John Malkovich for in the Line of Fire, who offered his staunchest competition.  I’ll come back to this in a moment.

            In the meantime, the Fugitive is a great movie!  The film stars movie-hero Harrison Ford as Dr. Richard Kimble, who is falsely accused of killing his wife, and subsequently escapes prison after being sentenced to death by lethal injection.  A manhunt led by US Marshall Deputy Sam Gerard (Jones), and what follows is Kimble evading the cops while leading them to the real criminal. 

            The Fugitive has a rare quality that lacks in most action flicks—that being that it’s sensible and still entertaining with plenty of action, and also contains good acting and reasonable cinematography, as well with good enough directing by Andrew Davis.  Since now, I have seen this movie three times, and never grown tired of it.  It’s entertaining and still suspenseful each time I watch it, which quite frankly, makes it a good action pic.

            In my first paragraph of my review I explained a little about the Best Supporting Actor Oscar that Jones received.  Jones gave a pretty darn good performance that is no doubt worthy of at least an Oscar nomination.  But maybe I am still disappointed when I say that Malkovich should have won, in my honest, deepest opinion.  Malkovich, who played the principal villain in, in the Line of Fire, was brilliant in that role.  Since seeing both films, I can agree to the fact that the Fugitive is marginally the superior film, though Malkovich may have delivered an equal if not superior acting performance to Jones.  Even so, the Fugitive is too good to not have won any Oscar, and I also suppose it’s good that Jones, who played the good guy versus Malkovich in the bad guy role, won.

             A lot of action flicks make for good action movies, though not always a good movie overall.  The Fugitive is a good action flick just as much as it is a very well-done movie. 

                                                  **** ½ /5