The Carey Treatment

Directed by Blake Edwards, The Carey Treatment follows pathologist Peter Carey (James Coburn) as he begins looking into a mysterious death after a colleague (James Hong’s David Tao) is arrested for murder. There’s ultimately little doubt that The Carey Treatment is at its best in its deliberately-paced yet mostly watchable first half, as Edwards, working from James P. Bonner’s screenplay, does an effective job of establishing the compelling central character and the investigation that eventually consumes him – with the better-than-average atmosphere heightened by Coburn’s predictably commanding performance and a smattering of overtly engrossing sequences. (The latter is certainly true of an electrifying interlude wherein Peter forces answers out of an unwilling witness by driving maniacally through Boston.) It’s disappointing to note, then, that the picture slowly-but-surely loses its grip on the viewer as it progresses into a meandering, underwhelming final half hour, as Edwards places an almost egregious emphasis on the impossibly convoluted conspiracy that’s ultimately at the heart of the movie’s mystery – which paves the way for an astonishingly anticlimactic finish and cements The Carey Treatment‘s place as a somewhat misguided (and misbegotten) adaptation of Michael Crichton’s superior novel.

** out of ****

Leave a comment