Z/Web

Not a film I was interested in seeing, but it was the only thing on at the time I was ready to see a film. So I went with modest enthusiasm. To my surprise, I liked this film a lot. It is modest and predictable in concept. We meet an American soldier stationed in Germany around the time of the Berlin wall collapse. He’s the guy knows everyone and can get you anything. He’s a slick talker who knows how to weave his superiors to do anything he needs. Meanwhile, he’s selling U.S. goods on the black market, cooking drugs in the basement, and driving his fancy Mercedes. Then along comes a new officer who’s got his number. He breaks the guy down, and it becomes a battle of wits between the two. To piss the officer off, the soldier begins dating the officer’s daughter, but that backfires when the officer destroys the guy’s prized Mercedes. Like I said, in concept it’s predictable — like one of Zack Morris’ scams on Saved by the Bell going awry and him learning his lesson by the end of the episode. But this one escalates to death and serious drugs and money, and in the end our hero barely escapes with his teeth and returns to his old tricks. There’s nothing profound here. Some of the characters, while interesting, are stereotypical, and the “twists” at the end are yawners. The uncomfortable part is that we’re supposed to like the scammer when he’s just stealing 1,000 gallons of Mop’n’Glo from the army, but feel justice is served when his serious drug activity doesn’t go as he planned. It’s the old “white lies are okay” approach to morality. Oh well. It’s still fun, though I’m cautious in being manipulated to like the guy. And the film has a neatly packaged happy ending that leaves us wondering how we got there (much isn’t explained). Not a great film, but more fun than I expected. A good rental.