Taglines: Where terror lives.
Pacific Heights, starring Michael Keaton as a psycho swindler who terrorizes a Nice Happy Couple (Melanie Griffith and Matthew Modine), offers a ’90s twist on the mysterious-intruder genre. The dramatic tensions here aren’t psychological — they’re not about gamesmanship and territoriality (as might have been the case in, say, the late ’60s).
They’re about real estate. Patty (Griffith) and Drake (Modine) are an unmarried, vaguely bohemian couple who decide to sink every penny they have into buying and renovating a handsome Victorian house in San Francisco. To make ends meet, they need to rent out the two rooms downstairs. Enter an ominous charmer named Carter Hayes (Keaton), who shows up in a black suit and a Porsche to match.
Carter, it’s soon apparent, is some sort of sinister, hustling phony. He refuses to pay the rent, makes noise at all hours, breeds an army of roaches, and won’t even answer the door if anyone complains. Drake tries to get even by turning off Carter’s electricity. But this is a legal no-no: Suddenly, it’s the well-meaning landlords — and not their devious tenant — who are in trouble with the law. Before Patty and Drake know it, they’re trapped, their dream of home-owning bliss turned to a nightmare.
Pacific Heights certainly succeeds at arousing feelings of vicarious frustration. It’s like one of those Pink Panther cartoons in which the Panther does battle with a testy housefly and ends up destroying his entire home. Since Carter’s threat is, at root, financial (it’s not as though he and Patty and Drake have any sort of personal relationship), the movie, though reasonably well directed by John Schlesinger (Midnight Cowboy, Marathon Man), is weirdly unsuspenseful. Even when we discover what it is Carter is up to, his ”scam” is so convoluted — and self-punishing — that it never really makes sense. With most villains, the big question is, ”Will they get away with it?” With Carter, I kept thinking, ”This is a living?”
Pacific Heights is a 1990 psychological thriller film directed by John Schlesinger, written by Daniel Pyne, and starring Melanie Griffith, Matthew Modine, and Michael Keaton. The original music score was composed by Hans Zimmer. The film’s tagline is: “It seemed like the perfect house. He seemed like the perfect tenant. Until they asked him to leave.”
The story location for the film is the Pacific Heights area of San Francisco. However, the actual film location for Drake and Patty’s house is in Potrero Hill in San Francisco, specifically at the corner of 19th and Texas Street. Other portions of the film were shot in Palm Springs, California.
Pacific Heights movie trailer.
Pacific Heights (1990)
Directed by: John Schlesinger
Starring: Melanie Griffith, Matthew Modine, Michael Keaton, Mako, Nobu McCarthy, Laurie Metcalf, Carl Lumbly, Tippi Hedren, Dorian Harewood, Dan Hedaya
Screenplay by: Daniel Pyne
Production Design by: Neil Spisak
Cinematography by: Amir Mokri
Film Editing by: Steven Ramirez, Mark Warner
Costume Design by: Bridget Kelly, Ann Roth
Set Decoration by: Clay A. Griffith, Debra Schutt
Art Direction by: Gershon Ginsburg, Michael Marcus, Sharon Seymour
Music by: Hans Zimmer
Distributed by: 20th Century Fox
Release Date: September 28, 1990
Hits: 222
