MOVIE REVIEW : Kurt Voss’ ‘Genuine Risk’ Doesn’t Take Very Many

The people who made “Genuine Risk” (selected theaters) would probably like us to believe they’re taking a few risks themselves. But they aren’t.

It’s a movie that fairly seethes with aspirations toward life on the edge, dangerous liaisons, the darkness beneath the everyday. Probably young writer-director Kurt Voss wanted the kind of high-style-gritty mix Stephen Frears achieves in “The Grifters.” But “Genuine Risk,” is safer, slighter: A formula job that only rarely breaks its mold.

Like Frears and Jim Thompson’s, most of the characters here are involved in hustles, large and small, ranging from high-rolling gambling czar and ex-’60s rocker Hellwart (Terence Stamp) to compulsive bettor Henry (Peter Berg). They’re all psychopaths on one level or another, denizens of a world of bars, racetracks, numbers joints and expensive, empty L.A. apartments. And they’re all firmly in the grip of lust or greed. What distinguishes them from each other is the murderous ways some of them satisfy their appetites.

Gambling is “Risk’s” central occupation. Protagonist Henry (Peter Berg), living on nerves, running out of money and luck, is pulled into the netherworld of big-time corruption and money by his off-handedly amoral buddy, Cowboy Jack (M. K. Harris). But, as much of the gambling is rigged or tainted, so is the movie. The lingo may be tough and profane, the images sharp and sinister, the blood may spill, the plot may seem to unfold with the steel-trap inevitability of old film noir-- but there’s a squishy-soft level of wish-fulfillment undermining everything.

Henry the schnook is both perpetual victim, pulled into the nightmare’s vortex, and lowlife Cinderfella stumbling through a ridiculous fantasy: He seduces the big boss’ busty mistress (Michelle Johnson), moves casually through low- and high-life L.A. worlds and improbably survives holocausts of gunplay that kill almost everyone else. He’s on a ludicrous lucky streak, and it’s not destiny that’s watching over him; it’s the movie-makers.

Voss might be wise to stay away from cliched thriller plots. In his last film, 1988’s “Border Radio,” co-directed with Alison Anders and with Dean Lent as cinematographer, a sometimes spiky look at the dulled-out world of L.A. punk rock was sabotaged by a lamebrained heist. There’s a musical element here too--jazzmen Teddy Wilson and Sid Haig are in the cast--but again, the weakest element is the plot. The strongest are simple scenes when Cowboy Jack and Henry quarrel in cars or nag and rag at each other in the dirty afternoon light of empty barrooms.

In fact, it’s Harris, and the reliably menacing and stylish Stamp, who give this movie some bite. Though his character--lean, mean, lank-haired Cowboy--is on an absurd macho trip, Harris gets something scary into him. Cowboy is a virtuoso of improvised death, but he also has his appealing side: like a confirmed sociopath trying to live up to the moral codes of Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch.” And, though he has to suffer through a silly death scene, Harris’ acting is good enough to suggest the entire world of casual psychopathology and messed-up corruption that “Genuine Risk” (MPAA rated R, for sex, nudity, language and violence) tries for and misses.