Reviews (3)

Far too good to be lost in an ocean of [bad] movies...
I was lucky enough to catch this movie on HBO one late night a few years back... And was smart enough to pop in a vcr tape and dub it off... WHY WON'T THEY RELEASE THIS MOVIE ON DVD?!... ...This movie kicks ...... The cast and acting both are great... There are a seldom few movies I can watch over and over and everytime pay as close of attention as I did the first night I saw it... This is one of those movies... I can't understand why it has been such an unknown film... Donal Logue (Blade, and now the star of the hit tv series "Grounded For Life") stars in this movie, and it is his best performance i've ever seen... I LOVE HIS CHARACTER... It is my favorite in the entire movie... The pairing of "Travis, Boo, and Cletus" is classic... If you haven't seen this movie, I strongly suggest you do... My rating out of 5 is a 10...

Far too good to be lost in an ocean of (...) movies...
I was lucky enough to catch this movie on HBO one late night a few years back... And was smart enough to pop in a vcr tape and dub it off... WHY WON'T THEY RELEASE THIS MOVIE ON DVD?! The cast and acting both are great... There are a seldom few movies I can watch over and over and everytime pay as close of attention as I did the first night I saw it... This is one of those movies... I can't understand why it has been such an unknown film... Donal Logue (Blade, and now the star of the hit tv series "Grounded For Life") stars in this movie, and it is his best performance i've ever seen... I LOVE HIS CHARACTER... It is my favorite in the entire movie... The pairing of "Travis, Boo, and Cletus" is classic... If you haven't seen this movie, I strongly suggest you do... My rating out of 5 is a 10...

Surprisingly good
I recently saw this late at night on TV and was surprised at how good it was (I wasn't expecting much)--and now I'm disappointed that it can't be found on DVD. It's basically a treasure-hunt movie, with the gold under (what else?) a grave in the swamps somewhere down South. The story may lack originality, but the dialogue and acting are fantastic. A cameo appearance by Eric Roberts in which he describes how his wife shoots him is absolutely hilarious. Even 80s-era teen star Anthony Michael Hall, playing an ex-con undertaker, finally plays a role well. Amazing. All in all, this is a very entertaining film. ... Read more

Reviews (11)

A real Lynchian kind of Movie, absolutely Flawless acting!
(by the way, just in case your not sure, Lynchian means like something David Lynch would Direct.) I have heard many people bag this movie, saying it doesn't make sence and it's too hard to follow. So I was glad to see these other reveiwers who felt as i did about this very unique movie. Tim Roth does his Best acting since Reservoir dogs in this rivorting thriller. I won't say anything about plot because its all to hard to put in words, but i will say this. Anyone who likes it, see the film "LOST HIGHWAY".

Pate bros 2nd joint rolled with creeper
The cool thing about watching movies constantly is that you see so many bad ones that occasionally a movie as slick as this plays out. The cast is top notch, as is the directing by the Pate brothers, whose other credits include "The Grave" and the short lived but cool TV show "GvsE". Plenty of twists and turns abound in this movie that centers around Roth(in one of his best performances) taking a lie ditector test from two shady cops(Rooker and Penn) to find out if he is a murderer. A film that relies on character development and suprises that pays off in the end with something to think about, this is a good one. It would be nice to see on DVD but is not yet released on that format.

A Schizophrenic Thriller About Epileptic Behaviour
Deciever aka Liar is caught in a real Catch22. On the one hand it wants to play mind games, to prove how opaque our first impressions really are. On the other it wants to be a drama about the moral impotence and bottled up rage of men. We don't know enough about the cop Braxton(Chris Penn) or his partner Kennisaw(Michael Rooker) to care about either their gambling or marital problems resprectively.

The opacity ofcourse is deliberate. If you want twists and turns then you must have mysterious characters doing inexplicable things. Well there goes the drama. The lack of character development allows the film-makers to do complete 180s with the plot, but any resulting suspense is academic with none of the viceral impact of say Se7en.

Credibility is a vital element when it comes to thrillers. Even when they're set in space we have to believe that the film-makers know as much as we do, that they are on the same ride as we are. But in Liar the Pate brother cheat, they give us flashbacks that are meant specifically for the audience. I believe they did this to avoid the supposed monotony of the one room setting, but the flashbacks all but destroy the film. If they can see beyond the characters' lies, it means that Liar is nothing more then manipulative mental masterbation where they provide the audience with red herrings to a solution they already know. As a frame of reference lets use Roman Polanski's underrated 1994 film Death & The Maiden. That film was set in a single location and used no flashbacks, but its characters were so well written and acted that it generated more genuine suspense in a single scene then Liar does in its entire running time. Another film, 1995's masterful The Usual Suspects justified the use of flashbacks by having a character tell a story and then let the director realise his story visually.

Did I even mention the film's laughable tendancy to treat Epilepsy as if it were the demon possessing Linda Blair in The Exorcist.

Its a shame really because the film is technically remarkable(lots of shadows, darkness and gold light). It also waists the brilliant Tim Roth, who as the rich, bitter, manipulative and epileptic suspect James Walter Wayland gives a preverse and powerful performance. Had the film been as clear eyed and sharp as Roth's performance we might have really had something here. Considering that Liar is ultimately about manipulation, it might be cleverly ironic that its authors would lie to and manipulate the audience. It would be cleverly ironic if weren't so incredibly frustrating.

Psychological pornography masked as "who-done-it?"
DECEIVER is an apt name for this movie. It has pretensions to a twisted detective procedural; pursuit of a warped-genius murderer (a la Hannibal Lector);and perhaps a demonic-vengeance thriller like "Angel Heart" or "The Fallen". It is merely twisted. The film, in fact, is a deliberate exercise in psychological pornography. Its principal character is portrayed as a sado-masochist who revels in acts of cruelty who effortlessly descends into a self-induced state of oblivion untrammeled by conscience or guilt. Tim Roth plays this demonic creature with subdued insolence and relish as he practices his solipsistic acts of malice on his bewildered high-society parents, high-priced call girls and the detectives attempting to indict him for a brutal murder. The film is a trip to Hell without the fascination such "pilgrimages" sometimes afford. The movie's emotional exploitation is never particularly clever, nor jolting and the manipulative machinations of Roth ( especially The Lie Detector sequences) are manifestly transparent and require little intelligence to dismiss them as trite and self-indulgent. If it were not for the "accomplished" acting of the principals in this movie its quality as a piece of unredeemable dreck would be instantly self-evident. Sometimes a viewer simply has to admit he has been "had". DECEIVER is the title of this noxious movie. The viewer is, in my estimate, THE DECEIVED...

Simply great.
Unlike most fils which tend to show/explain everything, this movie was like a really good book -- it made you think. It was a wonderfully dense story -- (i.e. even the scenes that seemed without purpose had purpose and meaning). A lovely parallel, interesting foreshadowing and an ending that, unlike the professional reviewers contend, was logical. ... Read more

Amazon.com

A wealthy heir (Tim Roth) is hauled in for interrogation by two seasoned detectives. Hooked up to a polygraph, the superintelligent murder suspect plays cat and mouse with the two cops (Michael Rooker, Chris Penn). As events unfold, the cops themselves have a thing or two to hide, and the suspect has an alibi of sorts: temporal-lobe epilepsy and alcoholism with a special fondness for absinthe. The rich boy uses his knowledge of the cops' personal skeletons to gain the upper hand over them. This is a film that has an abundance of stylish fillips and modern-day noir touches, but also has a convoluted, confusing plot and a set of unlikable characters. Roth probably has the best turn as the filthy-rich narcissist who alternates between being slimy and sympathetic. Michael Rooker, on the other hand, tensely chews the scenery as the cop with the nastiest secret. All in all, Deceiver tries to be a good movie but is undercut by poor character development, bewildering loose ends, a flat script, and a "what the hell was that?" ending. However, if you can overlook the plot shortcomings, this is a slick mystery in a purely cinematic sense, filled with head-spinning camera work, expressionistic shot compositions and lighting, and jumpy editing. --Jerry Renshaw ... Read more

Reviews (11)

A real Lynchian kind of Movie, absolutely Flawless acting!
(by the way, just in case your not sure, Lynchian means like something David Lynch would Direct.) I have heard many people bag this movie, saying it doesn't make sence and it's too hard to follow. So I was glad to see these other reveiwers who felt as i did about this very unique movie. Tim Roth does his Best acting since Reservoir dogs in this rivorting thriller. I won't say anything about plot because its all to hard to put in words, but i will say this. Anyone who likes it, see the film "LOST HIGHWAY".

Pate bros 2nd joint rolled with creeper
The cool thing about watching movies constantly is that you see so many bad ones that occasionally a movie as slick as this plays out. The cast is top notch, as is the directing by the Pate brothers, whose other credits include "The Grave" and the short lived but cool TV show "GvsE". Plenty of twists and turns abound in this movie that centers around Roth(in one of his best performances) taking a lie ditector test from two shady cops(Rooker and Penn) to find out if he is a murderer. A film that relies on character development and suprises that pays off in the end with something to think about, this is a good one. It would be nice to see on DVD but is not yet released on that format.

A Schizophrenic Thriller About Epileptic Behaviour
Deciever aka Liar is caught in a real Catch22. On the one hand it wants to play mind games, to prove how opaque our first impressions really are. On the other it wants to be a drama about the moral impotence and bottled up rage of men. We don't know enough about the cop Braxton(Chris Penn) or his partner Kennisaw(Michael Rooker) to care about either their gambling or marital problems resprectively.

The opacity ofcourse is deliberate. If you want twists and turns then you must have mysterious characters doing inexplicable things. Well there goes the drama. The lack of character development allows the film-makers to do complete 180s with the plot, but any resulting suspense is academic with none of the viceral impact of say Se7en.

Credibility is a vital element when it comes to thrillers. Even when they're set in space we have to believe that the film-makers know as much as we do, that they are on the same ride as we are. But in Liar the Pate brother cheat, they give us flashbacks that are meant specifically for the audience. I believe they did this to avoid the supposed monotony of the one room setting, but the flashbacks all but destroy the film. If they can see beyond the characters' lies, it means that Liar is nothing more then manipulative mental masterbation where they provide the audience with red herrings to a solution they already know. As a frame of reference lets use Roman Polanski's underrated 1994 film Death & The Maiden. That film was set in a single location and used no flashbacks, but its characters were so well written and acted that it generated more genuine suspense in a single scene then Liar does in its entire running time. Another film, 1995's masterful The Usual Suspects justified the use of flashbacks by having a character tell a story and then let the director realise his story visually.

Did I even mention the film's laughable tendancy to treat Epilepsy as if it were the demon possessing Linda Blair in The Exorcist.

Its a shame really because the film is technically remarkable(lots of shadows, darkness and gold light). It also waists the brilliant Tim Roth, who as the rich, bitter, manipulative and epileptic suspect James Walter Wayland gives a preverse and powerful performance. Had the film been as clear eyed and sharp as Roth's performance we might have really had something here. Considering that Liar is ultimately about manipulation, it might be cleverly ironic that its authors would lie to and manipulate the audience. It would be cleverly ironic if weren't so incredibly frustrating.

Psychological pornography masked as "who-done-it?"
DECEIVER is an apt name for this movie. It has pretensions to a twisted detective procedural; pursuit of a warped-genius murderer (a la Hannibal Lector);and perhaps a demonic-vengeance thriller like "Angel Heart" or "The Fallen". It is merely twisted. The film, in fact, is a deliberate exercise in psychological pornography. Its principal character is portrayed as a sado-masochist who revels in acts of cruelty who effortlessly descends into a self-induced state of oblivion untrammeled by conscience or guilt. Tim Roth plays this demonic creature with subdued insolence and relish as he practices his solipsistic acts of malice on his bewildered high-society parents, high-priced call girls and the detectives attempting to indict him for a brutal murder. The film is a trip to Hell without the fascination such "pilgrimages" sometimes afford. The movie's emotional exploitation is never particularly clever, nor jolting and the manipulative machinations of Roth ( especially The Lie Detector sequences) are manifestly transparent and require little intelligence to dismiss them as trite and self-indulgent. If it were not for the "accomplished" acting of the principals in this movie its quality as a piece of unredeemable dreck would be instantly self-evident. Sometimes a viewer simply has to admit he has been "had". DECEIVER is the title of this noxious movie. The viewer is, in my estimate, THE DECEIVED...

Simply great.
Unlike most fils which tend to show/explain everything, this movie was like a really good book -- it made you think. It was a wonderfully dense story -- (i.e. even the scenes that seemed without purpose had purpose and meaning). A lovely parallel, interesting foreshadowing and an ending that, unlike the professional reviewers contend, was logical. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Far too good to be lost in an ocean of [bad] movies...
I was lucky enough to catch this movie on HBO one late night a few years back... And was smart enough to pop in a vcr tape and dub it off... WHY WON'T THEY RELEASE THIS MOVIE ON DVD?!... ...This movie kicks ...... The cast and acting both are great... There are a seldom few movies I can watch over and over and everytime pay as close of attention as I did the first night I saw it... This is one of those movies... I can't understand why it has been such an unknown film... Donal Logue (Blade, and now the star of the hit tv series "Grounded For Life") stars in this movie, and it is his best performance i've ever seen... I LOVE HIS CHARACTER... It is my favorite in the entire movie... The pairing of "Travis, Boo, and Cletus" is classic... If you haven't seen this movie, I strongly suggest you do... My rating out of 5 is a 10...

Far too good to be lost in an ocean of (...) movies...
I was lucky enough to catch this movie on HBO one late night a few years back... And was smart enough to pop in a vcr tape and dub it off... WHY WON'T THEY RELEASE THIS MOVIE ON DVD?! The cast and acting both are great... There are a seldom few movies I can watch over and over and everytime pay as close of attention as I did the first night I saw it... This is one of those movies... I can't understand why it has been such an unknown film... Donal Logue (Blade, and now the star of the hit tv series "Grounded For Life") stars in this movie, and it is his best performance i've ever seen... I LOVE HIS CHARACTER... It is my favorite in the entire movie... The pairing of "Travis, Boo, and Cletus" is classic... If you haven't seen this movie, I strongly suggest you do... My rating out of 5 is a 10...

Surprisingly good
I recently saw this late at night on TV and was surprised at how good it was (I wasn't expecting much)--and now I'm disappointed that it can't be found on DVD. It's basically a treasure-hunt movie, with the gold under (what else?) a grave in the swamps somewhere down South. The story may lack originality, but the dialogue and acting are fantastic. A cameo appearance by Eric Roberts in which he describes how his wife shoots him is absolutely hilarious. Even 80s-era teen star Anthony Michael Hall, playing an ex-con undertaker, finally plays a role well. Amazing. All in all, this is a very entertaining film. ... Read more