Taglines: Stalked by a madman. Framed by a killer. Terrified by the truth.
Defenseless movie storyline. The lawyer Thelma “T.K.” Knudsen Katwuller is having a love affair with her client, Steven Seldes, accused of making under-age porn movies through the Blue Screen Production. When T.K. meets her old college friend Ellie Seldes, she finds that she is Steven’s wife and Ellie invites T.K. to have dinner with her family at her home.
T.K. decides to break-up with Steven and he asks her to meet him in his office. While waiting for Steven, T.K. finds that he owns the Blue Screen Production and had lied to her. The next morning, Ellie is arrested and accused of murdering her husband and Ellie hires T.K. to defend her. Detective Beutel feels that something is missing in the case.
Defenseless is a 1991 film directed by Martin Campbell. The film is starring Barbara Hershey, Sam Shepard, Mary Beth Hurt, J.T. Walsh, Kellie Overbey, John Kapelos, Jay O. Sanders, Sheree North, Randy Brooks and Marabina Jaimes and distributed by Seven Arts through New Line Cinema.
Film Review for Defenseless
When the main character of a movie is a female lawyer, you can be sure she has dangerously bad taste in men. In the slick, efficient thriller “Defenseless,” the lawyer is Barbara Hershey, and the client she is fooling around with owns a building where pornographic movies are made. Steven (J. T. Walsh) claims to be innocent of any crime and ignorant of the fact that he was renting space to the creators of such films as “Nudes on the Moon.” This raises the old question that drives films like “Jagged Edge”: is her client really a creep?
The trick of “Defenseless” is to stick almost exclusively to the perspective of Ms. Hershey’s character, whose improbable name is T. K. Katwuller. Her love affair sours fast. She knew that Steven was married, but she didn’t know that his wife was her old college roommate Ellie (Mary Beth Hurt). When Ellie runs into T. K. — we’re left to wonder whether it’s by chance or design — she insists that the lawyer come to dinner.
T. K. discovers a family whose bizarre emotions are barely under wraps. Like her fluffy blond hairdo, Ellie is a little too perky and perfect-looking. Their hostile teen-age daughter, Janna, wonders out loud why her father doesn’t get a more competent lawyer. T. K. can put up with a lot, but she is pushed over the brink when she hears Steven refr to Janna as Pieface, the same affectionate nickname he has called her. It is a mark of T. K.’s submerged good taste and the film’s occasional wit that she never liked being called Pieface to begin with.
The director, Martin Campbell (who made the competent Gary Oldman thriller “Criminal Law”), is best in such scenes, where the characters reveal some quirks and hide others until everything seems like an ominous hint of evil.
Because, of course, a murder takes place. We know that T. K. is not the murderer, but she has been in a bloody fight with the victim minutes before the killing; if the police learn about it she will definitely look like the murderer. The policeman in charge of the case is Sam Shepard, playing one of his slow-talking, sharp-witted characters, so he is bound to catch on eventually.
Before he does, T. K. is being stalked, possibly by the killer, possibly by the deranged father of a young woman who was used for a porno film, possibly by someone else entirely. She spends an inordinate amount of time alone in parking garages and dark, dangerous neighborhoods. Mr. Campbell doesn’t show much imagination here, but he brings some crispness to these stock scenes.
The plot has its weak spots. The red-herring character practically wears a sign reading Red Herring, and the film points in the general direction of the murderer early on. But the cast pulls “Defenseless” over these loopholes, bringing more fullness to the characters than the script suggests. Ms. Hurt is especially good as the socially proper, enigmatic wife.
When the truth is revealed, it seems there is a very dark side to all those nudes on the moon, and “Defenseless” turns more sordid than scary. Still, it is an effective, diverting little suspense film.
Defenseless (1991)
Directed by: Martin Campbell
Starring: Barbara Hershey, Sam Shepard, Mary Beth Hurt, J.T. Walsh, Kellie Overbey, John Kapelos, Jay O. Sanders, Sheree North, Randy Brooks, Marabina Jaimes
Screenplay by: James Hicks
Production Design by: Curtis A. Schnell
Cinematography by: Phil Meheux
Film Editing by: Chris Wimble
Costume Design by: Mary Rose
Set Decoration by: Douglas A. Mowat
Art Direction by: Colin D. Irwin
Music by: Curt Sobel
Distributed by: New Line Cinema
Release Date: August 23, 1991
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