MikePadgett.com

Sea of Love

— A streetwise city cop thriller that crawls familiar kerbs but more or less delivers the package.”

• Director: Harold Becker
• United States, 1989
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There are similarities between Sea of Love and Adrian Lyne’s marginally superior Fatal Attraction, in that both feature uniquely edgy female leads and leading men who lack self-control at crucial moments. In both movies, that lack of self-control is vital to the plot, yet only Pacino in Sea of Love is able to turn it into a character asset.

Pacino’s haggard detective has given twenty years’ service, his domestic stability and his sobriety to the police force when he falls for a murder suspect. The movie then plays out a pretty straightforward “is-she-isn’t-she” storyline with a side order of buddy cop congeniality provided by the ever-reliable John Goodman.

Whilst Ellen Barkin’s Helen cannot compete with the unnerving excellence of Glenn Close’s bunny boiler Alex Forrest – a true movie original – she does bring a streetwise roughness to the relationship which rubs up well against the detective’s barely hidden vulnerability.