The second screen adaptation of Kenneth Fearing's suspense novel, The Big Clock. The first, cleverly called The Big Clock, was in 1948, and only a fool would want to invite comparisons with it. The fool responsible for the remake, Roger Donaldson, avoids these for a while, with forty-five minutes of roundabout plotting -- or dillydallying (including a laughable "hot" scene in the backseat of a limousine, while Paul Anka and Julia Migenes sing the title tune in the background). The relocation of the story in Washington, D.C., gives the thing an aura of Costa-Gavras topicality, but other alterations have turned a tight ship into a sieve. The surprise twist at the end is a surprise all right: you never imagined that the storytelling was that slapdash, nor, in particular, that the most repugnant character in the movie would turn out to be an intuitive sleuth on a level above that of Sherlock Holmes. With Kevin Costner, Gene Hackman, Sean Young, and Will Patton. (1987) — Duncan Shepherd