Arlington Road

The Whole Nine Yards without Bruce Willis and without humour. Arlington Road is amusingly serious in the style of its narrative and, in terms of its content, it is an extremely, extremely paranoid attempt to follow in Hitchcock’s footsteps. It comes closest to the films of the master of suspense when Badalamenti’s music is brought into play. The state of uncertainty in which we are held until the final revelation, how poorly the formalistic façade masks the artificial construct, does not let up, mainly due to the performances of the two main actors and Joan Cusack, a Stepford-type housewife who will not ask her blood-stained husband questions, but she will readily advise him on how to wash out the stains. Unlike Tim Robbins, Jeff Bridges forgets to keep a cool head and those who pay the highest price for that are paradoxically his loved ones. Privacy or not, it is necessary to protect the homeland. Does the film warn against this idea or encourage it? Ask your neighbour. 60% (08.08.2012)

Arlington Road is a conflicting film that is based on the highly traumatic events surrounding the bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City in the mid-90s. It features a very decent cast and a typically Hollywood screenplay with several shocking revelations and plot twists. Herein lies the first hitch because the screenplay is somewhat overcomplicated. The initially very effective plot is, in fact, too dependent on the assumed actions of the victim, and a small hitch would be enough to foil the plan. Real conspiracies have simpler blueprints. The second problem lies in the core of the film - it speculatively assumes the existence of a deeply secretive and highly effective terrorist group that commits a horrifying attack. It is as if the film was made at the request of a police or secret service chief to increase their department's budget. It only creates psychosis, more surveillance cameras in the streets, greater powers in surveillance, and loss of privacy. The actual bombing in Oklahoma City was done by amateurs and succeeded due to the shameful underestimation of security measures and risks by far-right groups. Overall impression: 55%. The strongest scene of the film is the opening when a severely injured boy stumbles down an abandoned street... (15.07.2008)

No excessive action or pathos, Jeff Bridges excels and artistically outshines everyone else. The screenwriter made an effort too, and although the plot sometimes has weaker and boring passages, it overall maintains a very solid pace and occasionally truly surprises with shocking events. The ending is excellently handled. (02.05.2004)

At first glance, one would probably say that Arlington Road is not a special or breathtaking film and that its greatest asset is only the performances of the Bridges-Robbins duo. But that would be the case if it didn’t have that unique and shocking ending, which actually gave the whole story a much more complete shape and, in my eyes, ranks among the strongest I have ever seen. This is by no means a trashing of the rest of the film, because that would be unfair. It's a very suspenseful movie with an interesting idea and sober direction, that perhaps doses all the more impressive moments and twists somewhat unevenly and the thickening atmosphere is often cut off by dull and chatty passages, but instead of the screenwriter resolving everything nicely in the American way and bringing the film to its knees for good at the end, there's this completely unprecedented and skilful knock-out that firmly convinced me of the high qualities of this little-known and seemingly ordinary film. B-movie my ass! 80% (23.02.2013)