This whole movie seems like it was made about 10 years earlier, as if it was trying to take advantage of Blade Runner and Terminator’s popularity. A dystopian future where the super rich steal bodies from the past in order to achieve immortality is certainly a story that could be compelling even in modern times, particularly with the caveat that the ordinary people’s bodies are too derelict to be useful for the task. But that dystopian future wasn’t going to be happening in 2009 even from a 1992 perspective. Emilio Estevez performs capably as the freejacked body, but most of the cast is underutilized. Rene Russo plays her generic love-interest role. Anthony Hopkins makes occasional appearances, but doesn’t bring any spark. The only real spark to the whole production is Mick Jagger looking cooler than I ever thought he was capable of.

I really don’t know what to think of this film. It’s rather odd, occasionally amusing, and often feels very contemporary. The pre-credit scene does a great job of setting up Putney Swope as the new head of an advertising firm and then the rest of the film is all quite a bit of mayhem. I thought to myself that if someone wants to reflect on some of the odder choices Robert Downey Jr. has made in his career, that he came from the same genetic material as this film. Kudos for the odd, but intriguing choice to dub over Arnold Johnson’s voice with Downey Sr.’s deep tone; downvotes for the excessively long ad for Lucky Airlines.

A bit of a rough indie from the mid-80s, Parting Glances is a relatively light-hearted glimpse into NYC’s gay community early into the AIDS crisis. Following a married couple as they spend their last day together before one leaves on an African work assignment, it touches on themes of love, friendship, and career, all while not shying away from the relatively-new disease rampaging through the community, particularly through one HIV-positive character (an early role for Steve Buscemi). Sadly, this is the director’s only major film as he succumbed to AIDS a few years later; it’s a special film that doesn’t get too pulled down by the sadness and horrors of the disease while not completely ignoring them either.

There is some real unevenness in this story about a newly sexually liberated mother who is at odds with her more conservative ex-husband. Director Leonard Nimoy takes these two disparate viewpoints to their extremes where the actions of these parents, particularly the mother, become nonsensical. Diane Keaton tries to make the mother’s progress believable, but it doesn’t quite get there. She is supported in a impressive cast with Liam Neeson as her new boyfriend and Jason Robards, Joe Morton, Katey Sagal, and Teresa Wright all coming in for small roles.

I watched this in hopes of seeing some beautiful dance sequences and Patrick Swayze and Lisa Niemi together in a film. At least one of those parts was successful. Sadly, the filming of the dance scenes are cold and framed in ways that don’t emphasize the dance nearly enough. Double sadly, the entire film lacks polish with uninteresting, miscast characters, jarring music, and cliché story-telling. The finished product wasn’t awful, just not interesting enough to recommend.