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Rating:
Malice is a loopy and poorly thought-out but fun psychological thriller from screenwriter Aaron Sorkin and director Harold Becker. Delve too deeply into the plot mechanics and one is bound to come up with plenty of badly executed red herrings, character motivations that are puzzling at best, and plot twists that don't bear up under scrutiny. None of this is the point in a genre potboiler such as Malice, which is really all about the acting and how well the director stages his suspense sequences, and both of those elements are just fine here. Bill Pullman is a bit too much of a dimwit to be believed as a noteworthy scholar, though this is the fault of the material. However, Alec Baldwin is superb as a gifted surgeon whose arguments in favor of his own vanity and delusions of grandeur are compelling and have Sorkin's flair for mental and verbal gymnastics written all over them. Nicole Kidman is sufficiently frosty and aloof in a role that remains a bit of question mark for too long but fares better on a second viewing, once the film's final "secrets" are revealed. It's certainly not Shakespeare, but as pulp fiction goes, this one's a B-movie treat. Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

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