Blue Steel

Directed by Kathryn Bigelow, Blue Steel follows newly-minted police officer Megan Turner (Jamie Lee Curtis) as she finds herself embroiled in an increasingly sinister relationship with an obviously unhinged businessman (Ron Silver’s Eugene Hunt). It’s a fairly run-of-the-mill premise that should’ve, by all rights, resulted in a generic blank-from-hell thriller, and yet filmmaker Bigelow delivers a thoroughly stylish piece of work that filters a salacious screenplay, which she cowrote with Eric Red, through a surprisingly artful lens – with this vibe certainly heightened by seriously compelling work by both Curtis and Silver. (The latter is especially captivating as a man clearly and vividly losing his grip on sanity.) There’s little doubt, too, that Bigelow’s superlative handling of the picture’s suspense-oriented moments elevates things on a recurring basis, with the steadily escalating atmosphere paving the way for a midsection rife with tense, spellbinding sequences – although it’s just as obvious that the whole thing loses some momentum as it progresses into its exceedingly (and often excessively) over-the-top third act. The end result is a somewhat erratic endeavor that’s generally far more accomplished than much of its similarly-themed brethren, and it’s a shame, certainly, that Blue Steel isn’t more highly regarded among aficionados of this sort of thing.

*** out of ****