There’s a murder. It’s at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. And that’s… basically the pitch. Murder at 1600 (1997) wants to be In the Line of Fire meets All the President’s Men, but ends up more like CSI: West Wing. It’s not that the film is bad—it’s just that it was released into a marketplace that had already overdosed on political thrillers and didn’t need another mid-tier one led by a martial arts expert playing Sherlock with a badge. Still, if you’re a sucker for late-‘90s paranoid pulp with a fax machine-level understanding of geopolitics, you’ll find some charm in its chaotic conspiracy-by-numbers approach.
Welcome to the White House, Population: Cliché
Producer Arnold Kopelson, who once gave us Platoon and The Fugitive, apparently took a long lunch and decided America needed Die Hard with decorum. The pitch? What if a secretary dies in the West Wing restroom and it unravels a cabal of war-hawk Washingtonians trying to overthrow the president because he won’t play Risk with North Korea? The only thing missing is a shadowy cabal named after a chess piece.
Director Dwight Little, best known for Halloween 4 and Marked for Death, took on the project with the intention of channeling '70s political thrillers. Unfortunately, he didn’t get Three Days of the Condor—he got 24 Season 6 on a budget. There’s tension, sure, but it’s often the kind you feel waiting for AOL to connect in a room full of red herrings, redundant flashbacks, and D.C. skyline establishing shots.
And then came the great Absolute Power debacle. Murder at 1600 was poised for release, test screenings went well, and then Clint Eastwood apparently whispered into Warner Bros.’ ear like a leathery Rasputin: “Hold my revolver, I’m dropping my movie first.” And just like that, Murder at 1600 was demoted to copycat status by timing—proof that in Hollywood, as in politics, it’s not what you do, it’s who you do it before.
The Case of the Miscast President’s Son
Wesley Snipes was a late addition, stepping in after Bruce Willis dropped out, presumably to moonlight as a harmonica-playing ghost cop somewhere else. Snipes brings the physicality, the charisma, and a touch of his trademark eyebrow sarcasm. He plays Harlan Regis, a homicide detective with a bleeding heart and a wrecking ball’s finesse, whose government housing is about to be bulldozed—subtle, this film is not.
Diane Lane plays Agent Nina Chance, a Secret Service sniper who may or may not be emotionally sedated throughout the movie. They share some chemistry, and even filmed love scenes—axed in post because apparently America in 1997 still wasn’t ready for sexy competence across racial lines in the West Wing. Alan Alda chews scenery as a sinister National Security Advisor quoting Teddy Roosevelt like a Bond villain with tenure. And Tate Donovan as the president’s feral son is such a nepotism tornado, you’d think the script was co-written by Jared Kushner.
Production-wise, they recreated the Oval Office in Canada with a level of accuracy that would make a presidential historian weep into his Ken Burns box set. Too bad the movie doesn't know what to do once it gets there. The plot meanders through conspiracy tropes like a kid in a Halloween store—hidden tapes, forged appointment books, sex scandals, sniper showdowns in service tunnels—until it slams into a finale where the president is saved by a Secret Service agent in handcuffs. Subtlety left the building twenty minutes before the credits rolled.
You Had to Be There, Or Not
Critics weren’t kind. Murder at 1600 hit theaters and promptly face-planted into a lukewarm puddle of meh. It earned just over $25 million, with most reviewers citing its formulaic structure and reliance on clichés as reasons for their disinterest. On Rotten Tomatoes, it sits at a weary 32%—which, if we’re honest, is the film critic equivalent of “bless your heart.”
Still, in retrospect, it’s not a total wash. Director Dwight Little stands by the film, calling it “a good Hollywood movie.” And he’s not wrong. It is a Hollywood movie. It checks every box: cop with a tragic backstory, sassy partner, corrupt official, last-minute reversal, and a scene where the president owes the hero a favor. The only thing missing is a John Williams theme and a McDonald’s tie-in toy shaped like the Lincoln Bedroom.
Curiously, some fans regard it as a comfort thriller—a relic of the Clinton years when the most significant scandal you could imagine was a murder in the bathroom and not, say, armed mobs in buffalo hats scaling the Capitol. It’s the kind of movie you forget about until you see it in a $5 DVD bin and think, “Did Wesley Snipes fight the Deep State once?” Yes, yes, he did.
3 Stars for the Effort, 5 Stars for the Nostalgia
Murder at 1600 isn’t a classic. It’s not even an especially good thriller. But it’s competently made, unironically earnest, and peppered with just enough unintentional camp to warrant a revisit. Think of it as the polyester blazer of ‘90s cinema: unfashionable, a little boxy, but still perfectly wearable on the right occasion—like a rainy Sunday or a cynical rewatch binge.
⭐️⭐️⭐️ (3/5)
#MurderAt1600 #SnipesVsTheState #ClintonEraConspiracies #OvalOfficeAndOveracting #DianeLaneDeservedBetter #AlanAldaDidIt #ThreeStarsAndAFaxMachine
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