Normal Life (1996)

Director:

John McNaughton

Writers (WGA):

Peg Haller (written by) &
Bob Schneider (written by)

Release Date:

25 October 1996 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama

Tagline:

Love Was Their Addiction, Crime Was The Drug.

Plot:

Chris is young idealistic cop who falls in love and gets married to Pam, a beautiful but emotionally...

Plot Keywords:

Police | Police Officer | Bank Robber | Cop As Criminal | Drug Addict

US TV Schedule:

Mon. July 21

4:15 AM

HBO

Cast

Ashley Judd	...	Pam Anderson
Luke Perry	...	Chris Anderson
Bruce A. Young	...	Agent Parker (as Bruce Young)
Jim True-Frost	...	Mike Anderson
Edmund Wyson	...	Darren
Michael Skewes	...	Officer Swift
Scott Cummins	...	Hank Chilton
Kevin Mukherji	...	Homeowner
Kate Walsh	...	Cindy Anderson
Tom Towles	...	Frank Anderson
Penelope Milford	...	Adele Anderson
Brian McCann	...	Justice of the Peace
Dawn Maxey	...	Eva
Kevin Hurley	...	Norman
Brian Blondell	...	Toy store clerk

MPAA:

Rated R for scenes of violence, sexuality, drug use and language.

Runtime:

101 min | Portugal:89 min | UK:102 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Astrocolor)

Sound Mix:

Ultra Stereo

Certification:

USA:R (certificate #34237) | Iceland:16 | Germany:16 | Portugal:M/12 | Spain:18 | UK:18

Filming Locations:

Arlington Heights, Illinois, USA

Company:

Fine Line Features

Trivia:

The bar where Chris and Pam first meet is the Bartlett Tap, and is located in downtown Bartlett. It's a tavern that has been there since the 1800's.

Goofs:

Factual errors: Pam Anderson said her telescope was a Newtonian reflector; however, it was a long focal length 60mm refractor.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Chris Anderson: Lock and load. You ready?
[Pam nods]
Chris Anderson: Time to go.

A real disappointment

Normal Life starts out with great promise, with a great burst of energy right at the start. But that energy fizzles out very quickly and what we are left with is a rather bad movie. The film follows a husband and wife who happen to rob banks for a living. The movie begins with their last, ultimately failed, robbery. We see the husband arrested and the wife lead police on a high-speed chase as she attempts to get away. And then we go back in time, back to the beginning, to see how these two ill-fated lovers met and what brought them to the rather unfortunate situation we have just seen. Turns out the husband, Chris, as played by Luke Perry, is a former cop. And the wife, Pam, as played by Ashley Judd, is completely and utterly nuts. A whole team of psychiatrists couldn't help this girl. But Chris thinks he can and he'll do anything to make her happy. Suffice to say their relationship doesn't quite work out as he envisioned. A happily married couple they are not.

Eventually Chris loses his job as a cop and starts robbing banks. When Pam discovers what he is doing she is rather excited and suddenly much more enamored with her husband than she had been. And she wants in on the action. So they start robbing banks together and eventually we end up back where we started at the film's beginning. Back where it seemed the film had some promise. But Normal Life never lives up to that promise. It's terribly scripted. Much of the dialogue is utterly ridiculous. The acting leaves much to be desired, most notably with Perry going over the top again and again in his attempts to convey anger and frustration. He's constantly over-emoting and at times it's so laughable it's hard for the viewer to stifle a chuckle. Which is a problem because this is not meant to be a comedy.

The seemingly endless confrontations and arguments between Chris and Pam become rather monotonous after a while. It's just the same thing over and over again. Every few minutes the two leads have a fight about something. It's like clockwork. It's also exceedingly dull. The story never moves along. We just spend the whole time watching these two people bicker and watching Pam have one psychotic episode after another. OK, their relationship isn't quite working out, we get it. Move along, please. It's a frustrating movie to watch because it started with such promise and then just does not work at all. You get the feeling it should have been a lot better than it is. As it is it's a rather tedious movie.