One Night Stand (1997)

Touches You

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

I couldn't tell what was supposed to be the point of "One Night Stand". So there was a bunch of stuff about interracial relationships. Many other movies have done a much better job with that stuff. How could Mike Figgis, after creating a masterpiece like "Leaving Las Vegas" create something so disjointed with this movie? It wastes Wesley Snipes, Nastassja Kinski, Kyle MacLachlan, Ming-Na, Robert Downey Jr and John Ratzenberger on complete nonsense. If this movie has any redeeming qualities, it's that it gave Thomas Haden Church an early starring role, paving the way for him to star in "Sideways".So, in conclusion, Wesley Snipes's character says that anything's better than LA. I, for one, would rather choke on LA's smog than have to watch this movie again.

**** Spoilers THROUGHOUT - do not read if you don't wish to know plot ***I'd never heard of this movie. I find it interesting that it gathered such a high proportion of foreign reviewers. Was this more highly promoted overseas than in the U.S.? I've never heard anyone in the U.S. refer to this.This is an intriguing movie primarily due to the truly wonderful caution-to-the-winds casting and the understated, very lightly limned love affair that yields the title. I'd never seen a Wesley Snipes movie, so I know him only from advertisements for action movies I'd no particular interest in seeing. In this, he's very much the center of the movie - yet quite understated and somewhat disagreeable -- in somehow an appealing way.As fine a performance as Downey gives, I don't like the plot point of a dying man causing others to "seize the day". It's simply too obvious - and although I know this is the movie's central theme, I don't like it because I don't believe "seizing the day" should ever mean jettisoning those to whom one has pledged to be faithful throughout life. Nor do I believe that one should determine all decisions in life by the criterion of what is likely to yield greater fulfillment/satisfaction. Such a criterion would mean the jettisoning of any obligation, any pledge, any promise, that is burdensome, onerous, draining to honor. When such pledges are those of marriage vows made before God and man - I have no truck with those who say it's the better course to abandon them because life is short and better times lie elsewhere. Sure, perhaps one should have married another. So? One didn't. The past exists - and vows are made to be kept.So, do I disagree with the central theme of this movie? Yup.Yet I still enjoyed this very much - largely due to the casting and for a change, the very skeletal nicely written plot. Unlike a few others commenting, I did find Snipes and Kinski to have a chemistry together - and found the pairing of white Pole and black American intriguing.I loved MacLachlan's performance (so many of those around a homosexual dying of AIDS do NOT fit - and yet they are always shown in drama as being happily approving of homosexuality).Well Maclachlan isn't - yet amazingly the movie doesn't demonize him. He cares deeply, loves so strongly his brother - and hates the fact that immoral behavior caused his death. It's a great character. MacLachlan does a great job but so do all. Thomas Haden Church is superb (a strongly unlikeable character - all arrogance). One thing I like about the movie is its pretence that race is just wholly irrelevant to people's considerations. I sometimes like to think so - but don't really think all in the country act THAT heedless of race when it comes to fundamental decisions about marriage, children, etc. Hmmm, perhaps in L.A.? Does it matter to no one if their children will not resemble their own complexion? I doubt it - yet it's appealing to see a movie in which this indifference is assumed.The ending is meant to be a surprise - but isn't really - and does seem meant to produce a jack-in-the-box response in the viewer. (But the screenwriter just seemed to be having fun - that's OK but it does reduce the movie's dramatic effect).Do see this - it's remarkable for everyone's performances- but the story itself is just, well, quite intriguing.

In this excellent movie we are told an apparently very simple story where life meets death, success crosses with failure, conjugal life redounds in adultery and love triumphs over it all though in a somewhat strange way. A man's best friend is dying of AIDS. He comes to visit him and that fact unchains a lot of coincidences and accidental events which will change some people's lives. This story is really made of factual coincidences but this circumstance far from being a flaw, is its backbone since life itself is full of strange coincidences and those shown here are not improbable. Life is really an orange like the dying man tells his best friend in his deathbed. What does this mean indeed? The answer is not given in the movie so it's up to you to find it by yourself. Another very important feature of the plot is the solid friendship between these two men which is revealed by some very moving deeds and circumstances. One last word for the sound track music which is also excellent and adequate to the atmosphere of the movie thus reinforcing it and making us feel it more deeply. And one last warning: prudes, abstain from seeing this movie because you will hate it not so much for certain scenes (as a matter of fact we have seen a lot of more explicit ones in a lot of famous movies) but because you won't be able to lay your moral prejudice aside in order to admire the beauty of this true love story or to understand its rather odd end. Is it important to say that the lovers' couple is here composed of a black man and a white woman (Wesley Snipes and Nastassja Kinski who perform their roles very well)? I don't think so.

Blame it on me, but the only reason I wanted to see this film for was that Nastassja Kinski plays in it. So for this alone it justifies being fixed at the screen for 90 minutes...but for the rest? I really wouldn't know.... It all starts with Wesley Snipes who travels from LA to New York to see his sick buddy Charlie who is seropositive. Wesley has a perfect familylife, two kids, a dog and a lovely wife Ming-Na. Everything goes fine till he misses his flight and bumps onto Karen (Nastassja Kinski, with blonde hair this time!). Everything is innocent (they go to an opera) till they are robbed and madame Kinski begs him to stay the night with her as she's still dead afraid. And of course it happens... You can't blame Snipes, Ming-Na....it's Nastassja, remember? The day after Wesley flies back home and his life changes...the most interesting part of the movie by the way as the dog smells something...! Look I could go on and tell you the whole movie but that wouldn't be fair. Nothing more interesting happens and if it does it is pure Hollywood-nonsense (the last 10 minutes are even completely stupid). "One night stand" certainly isn't a bad movie, it even doesn't bore one minute, but it's just a bit too empty and you can't blame the actors as Wesley Snipes plays his role perfect but actors are bound to the script, a script that is a bit too much like those telemovies that are based on true stories. Watch it but expect nothing, expect...well you know!