D.o.a. 1988 Full Movie

[In Libman]

DO.A. is a 1988 American neo-noir[3] film directed by Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel. A remake of the 1950 film of the same name, it stars Dennis Quaid, Meg Ryan and Charlotte Rampling, and was filmed in Austin, Texas and San Marcos, Texas. It was theatrically released in the United States on March 18, 1988, to generally positive reviews.

Thirty-six hours previously, Cornell is on campus. He is a college professor, was once a promising writer, made his name and is secure in his tenure, but he has spent the last four years going through the motions and playing it safe. Cornell helps his friend Hal Petersham with his first book.

While Cornell is in his office, a promising student, Nick Lang, jumps off a building right outside his office window in an apparent suicide. This, coupled with the depressing Christmas season, unseasonably hot weather, and a pending divorce from his estranged wife, Gail, whom he suspects was having an affair with Lang, leads Cornell to seek out the local bars for a night of heavy drinking. There he meets admiring student Sydney Fuller and they proceed to get drunk.

The next morning, Cornell, feeling his sickness is more than just a hangover, stops by the campus medical clinic for a checkup. After running some tests, they discover that he has been poisoned and has 36 hours to live. An incredulous Cornell staggers out to try to make sense of it all.

Aided by Fuller, whom he kidnaps by super-gluing himself to her arm, he attempts to recreate the events of the previous night hoping to discover who could have murdered him. The list of suspects includes his wife, who is also the victim of a murder, which the police make half-hearted efforts to pin on Cornell.

In a subplot, it is explained that Lang's college tuition was being paid for by Fitzwaring; despite her having shot Lang's father years ago in self-defense after he broke into her home and killed her husband. Lang's death is a harsh blow to both Fitzwaring and her irresponsible daughter, Cookie, who in a drunken rant reveals her and Lang's sexual escapades.

Later, after a skirmish with Bernard results in Cookie's unfortunate death, Fitzwaring finally reveals to Cornell that Lang was her son from a previous marriage she walked away from to marry her wealthy late husband, without actually finalizing the divorce from her former spouse. When the jilted lover brought this revelation to Mr. Fitzwaring, he threatened to cut her off from their daughter, forcing Fitzwaring to shoot both men to silence them. With both her son and daughter dead, Fitzwaring ends her own life through suicide.

Back at the police station, Cornell has solved the crime. His friend Hal Petersham had read and was so impressed by Nick Lang's manuscript that he decided to kill Lang and steal the novel for himself. This involved killing anyone who knew that Lang was the original author, including Cornell and his wife, who was in possession of a copy Lang had given her. The tragic irony for Cornell is that due to weariness, he instead gave Lang's novel a pass without ever having read it. Petersham shows no remorse, callously stating it was Cornell's own fault that he believed he had. After a scuffle, Cornell shoots Petersham who then falls to his death out his office window. Cornell resigns himself to his fate.

Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film three stars out of four, calling it a "witty and literate thriller".[7] Caryn James of The New York Times called it "one of the season's biggest disappointments".[8]

I then watched the 1988 neo-noir remake and I have to admit I liked it also but would give it a lower rating of 7 out of 10. Except for the main idea and the beginning, it is not really a remake of the 1950 film. It is a completely different movie with new characters, motives, murders, etc. If it had been a scene for scene remake I doubt if I would have been able to watch it all.

Sorry Dan, but fashion and I will never catch up to this pointless remake. If you are going to remake a classic like D.O.A. you should do it better, or at least, like the remake of Out of the Past, throw in Rachel Ward and some un-needed nudity.

Touchstone Pictures Original U.S. One-Sheet Poster for the Rocky Morton and AnnAbel Jankel directed crime film D.O.A. (1988) starring Dennis Quaid, Meg Ryan, Charlotte Rampling and Daniel Stern. Time waits for no man, and Quaid is pinned to the inexorable tik-tok. A nice design. MovieArt Original Film Posters in Austin, Texas guarantees that this poster is an authentic, vintage U.S. one-sheet for this film. MovieArt Austin does not sell reproductions.

Meg Ryan - Actor

Dennis Quaid - Actor

ROCKY MORTON - Director

ANNABEL JANKEL - Director

Charlotte Rampling - Actor

Daniel Stern - Actor

Released in 1988, the murder mystery had much promise. After all, it was a loose remake of an iconic Fifties whodunit of the same title. Its leads were Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan, two sexy Hollywood darlings on the verge of megastardom. At the helm were Annabel Jankel and Rocky Morton, co-directors of the innovative, critically acclaimed and quintessentially Eighties TV series The Max Headroom Show.

D.O.A. is the story of Dexter Cornell (Quaid), a cynical English professor and once-promising novelist who barely conceals his contempt for his job and students. He leads an unfulfilling life of halfhearted teaching, boozing with his colleague Hal (Daniel Stern) and dealing with his crumbling marriage to his wife, Gail (Jane Kaczmarek).

After a very bad day when Gail hands him divorce papers, Dexter goes on a bender, culminating in an awkward morning after when he wakes up in the dorm room of one of his students, Sydney Fuller (Ryan). So hung over he can barely function, Dexter visits his doctor, who runs a few tests and delivers the bad news at the heart of D.O.A.: Sometime the night before, someone poisoned Dexter -- and he has about 36 hours to live. He decides to spend his final hours finding the culprit and solving his own murder.

Not a bad setup at all -- but as Dexter races against the clock to find his killer, D.O.A. becomes a parade of overcooked noir conventions and preposterous plot twists. Among them are a femme fatale (Charlotte Rampling as a wealthy, steely-eyed widow), a lethal love triangle, plenty of foreshadowing and red herrings, a narrow escape from a nail gun-wielding killer and a car chase ending in a tar pit. (A tar pit? D.O.A. was filmed mostly in Austin, but definitely wasn't set here. Its setting is unnamed.) Oh yeah, there also is a torrid romance between Dexter and Sydney -- because, you know, Meg Ryan.

D.O.A.'s underlying idea is intriguing, so it's a shame the story built on this premise is so unsubtle and unbelievable. (Among other things, Dexter has an amazing amount of stamina for a guy who will die in a few hours. Despite having a deadly toxin in his vital organs, he still manages to do a lot of running and climbing, survive two more attempts to kill him and make passionate, doomed love to Sydney.) The lack of character development also is disappointing; it's minimal for Dexter and almost nonexistent for the other characters, giving us little reason to care what happens to the luckless professor or anyone else in the film.

So, what makes D.O.A. watchable? It moves quickly enough to counter many of its flaws, with plenty of well-choreographed action. It's a very stylish affair, with great (if sometimes comically overdone) noir visuals. There is some smart humor, most of it thanks to the self-deprecating Dexter. ("Nobody plots to kill an English professor. We just don't inspire that kind of passion," he says in one of his more frustrated moments.) And anyone with Eighties nostalgia will enjoy the big hair, MTV vibe, thumping soundtrack and ubiquitous bit players of the era (Brion James, Jack Kehoe, Christopher Neame) in minor roles.

Not surprisingly, D.O.A. opened to mixed reviews (Siskel and Ebert gave it two thumbs up, but mostly for its style). Audiences were just as ambivalent; the film earned just $12 million in its short theatrical run.

Austin/Texas connections: D.O.A. was filmed in Austin and San Marcos. Austin locations include the Travis County Courthouse, State Capitol, St. Edward's University, Sixth Street and Congress Avenue. Dennis Quaid is from Houston. Several Texan actors appear in minor roles, including former Austinite John Hawkes and, of course, Marco Perella. The band in a bar scene is Timbuk3, an Austin fave of the Eighties and Nineties.

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