November 'Nick's Pix:' ONE FALSE MOVE & Book Signing
Well, it's that time of the month again, and one of my favorite nights of the month is coming up.
It's time for another Nick's Pix screening at the beautiful Classic Cinemas Lake Theater in downtown Oak Park, where the wonderful people at Classic Cinemas give me the run of their enormous Theater 2, let me pick whatever movie I want, introduce it, watch it with an audience, talk about it afterward, and give away some prizes.
I still can't believe I get to do this every month. And on Wednesday, November 11th, at 7:00 p.m., I'm going to be showing a movie that I absolutely love, a brilliant, suspenseful, beautifully made crime thriller from 1992 that I think deserves a much bigger audience: Carl Franklin's One False Move.
One of the greatest things about hosting Nick's Pix is that I get to choose movies that mean something to me. Sometimes I pick a big Hollywood hit, a beloved comedy, or a classic that everybody knows. Sometimes it's a cult favorite or a genre picture that people have been watching and quoting for decades.
But every once in a while, I get the opportunity to show a movie that never really found the audience it deserved, a movie that slipped through the cracks despite being absolutely terrific. And that's exactly what One False Move is. In fact, if you want to know what the term "sleeper" really means when it comes to movies, this is one of the best examples I can think of.
One False Move is a terrific Southern noir crime thriller directed by Carl Franklin and written by Billy Bob Thornton and Tom Epperson. It stars the late, great Bill Paxton, Thornton himself, Cynda Williams, Michael Beach, and Jim Metzler, and it's one of those movies that grabs you immediately and never lets go.
It's dark, violent, funny, surprising, and filled with extraordinary performances, but what makes it special is that underneath all the crime and suspense, it's really a movie about people, their histories, their secrets, and the terrible consequences of decisions they've made.
The story begins in Los Angeles, where three criminals commit a series of brutal murders during a robbery involving money and cocaine. There's Ray Malcolm, played by Billy Bob Thornton, a volatile, dangerous criminal who seems to be constantly operating about two seconds away from doing something incredibly stupid.
His partner is Pluto, played by Michael Beach, a frighteningly intelligent and methodical killer who may actually be the most dangerous person in the movie. And traveling with them is Ray's girlfriend, Lila Walker, who goes by the name Fantasia, played by the wonderful Cynda Williams.
After the killings, the three head east, and the investigation eventually leads two Los Angeles detectives, played by Jim Metzler and Earl Billings, to the little town of Star City, Arkansas. That's where we meet Dale "Hurricane" Dixon, the local police chief, played by Bill Paxton.
Hurricane is a friendly, enthusiastic, slightly goofy small-town cop who knows everybody, loves his job, and is absolutely thrilled at the prospect of working with two big-city detectives on a major murder investigation. He sees this as his opportunity to finally do some real police work, and the detectives initially regard him as something of a country bumpkin.
But Hurricane isn't nearly as simple as he appears to be, and neither is the situation developing around him. It turns out that Fantasia grew up in Star City, and her return brings some painful history and long-buried secrets to the surface.
What begins as a relatively straightforward story about three criminals on the run gradually becomes something much more complicated, emotionally devastating, and suspenseful. And that's about all I want to tell you about the plot, because one of the great pleasures of One False Move is discovering where it goes and how brilliantly it gets there.
Carl Franklin directs the hell out of this movie. Franklin started his career as an actor before moving into directing, learning his craft working on low-budget genre pictures for Roger Corman, including the 1989 David Carradine action movie Nowhere to Run.
And let's not forget that Corman helped launch the careers of filmmakers like Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, and Jonathan Demme.
Franklin went on to direct the terrific Devil in a Blue Dress and Out of Time, both with Denzel Washington, High Crimes with Morgan Freeman and Ashley Judd, and the moving family drama One True Thing with Meryl Streep, Renée Zellweger, and William Hurt.
He's continued working extensively in television, including episodes of Ray Donovan and the Monster anthology. He's a remarkably versatile director, but I still think One False Move is one of his finest achievements.
The history of this movie is fascinating. Made independently for about $2.5 million, with financing from I.R.S. Records, it was originally supposed to go straight to video. But then critics started seeing it, word of mouth spread, and people realized this was something special.
Roger Ebert championed it, and Gene Siskel actually named One False Move his favorite movie of 1992. It didn't make much money, but Franklin won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Director, and the film became one of the great examples of that remarkable wave of intelligent, daring American independent filmmaking in the early 1990s.
The screenplay by Billy Bob Thornton and Tom Epperson is absolutely outstanding. This was one of Thornton's earliest major screenwriting credits, several years before he became a household name with Sling Blade, and you can already see what a gifted writer he was.
The dialogue is sharp, funny, and completely believable. The characters are complicated, the situations are unpredictable, and the violence is genuinely disturbing because Franklin never treats it like entertainment. When somebody gets hurt in this movie, you feel it.
There's nothing glamorous about these criminals, and there's nothing particularly romantic about the lives they're leading.
The film also has a wonderful understanding of the American South, particularly the differences between the big-city detectives and the people living in this small Arkansas community. Franklin explores race, class, prejudice, and the assumptions people make about one another without ever turning the movie into a lecture.
There's a remarkable amount going on beneath the surface, and the movie trusts its audience to recognize it. It's beautifully photographed, the atmosphere is thick with tension, and Franklin knows exactly when to let a scene breathe and when to tighten the screws.
And then there are the performances.
Bill Paxton was one of my favorite actors, and I miss him terribly. What a wonderful, versatile performer he was. By the time he made One False Move, he'd already appeared in movies like Weird Science, Aliens, and Kathryn Bigelow's great vampire film Near Dark, and he would go on to bigger successes with movies like Twister.
But I think his performance as Hurricane Dixon is among the very best things he ever did. He's funny, warm, enthusiastic, and almost childlike in his excitement about this investigation, but Paxton gradually reveals an entirely different side of the character. It's a deceptively complicated performance, and he makes every moment feel absolutely genuine.
Billy Bob Thornton is terrific as Ray, and Michael Beach is downright chilling as Pluto. Beach has this remarkable ability to make a character terrifying without constantly raising his voice or announcing how dangerous he is.
Jim Metzler and Earl Billings are excellent as the Los Angeles detectives, particularly in the way they initially underestimate Hurricane. Everybody in this movie feels like a real person rather than a collection of familiar crime-movie clichés.
But the performance I especially want to single out is Cynda Williams as Fantasia.
Williams was born in Chicago, and she had already appeared in Spike Lee's Mo' Better Blues before making this film. She and Billy Bob Thornton became romantically involved and married during the production, although the marriage didn't last. Williams continued working in films and television, but I've always felt she deserved a much bigger career than she ultimately had.
Her performance in One False Move is extraordinary. She's the emotional center of the film, a woman trapped between a terrible present and a painful past, desperately trying to find some way out of the life she's created for herself. Williams gives the character intelligence, vulnerability, strength, and heartbreaking humanity, and the movie would not be nearly as powerful without her.
That's one of the reasons I love One False Move so much. Yes, it's an incredibly suspenseful crime thriller, and yes, there are some shocking moments of violence and some wonderfully constructed sequences. But Franklin and his actors make you care about these people.
The movie is about much more than catching a couple of killers. It's about the choices people make, the lives they leave behind, and the things that can come back to haunt them years later.
It's a great example of how a genre movie can be intelligent, emotionally complex, and genuinely moving without sacrificing an ounce of entertainment value.
And now I get to show it on the big screen in a beautiful 4K restoration, which makes me incredibly happy. This is exactly the kind of movie I love introducing to people.
If you've seen One False Move before, you know how good it is, and I think you're going to love revisiting it in a theater. If you've never seen it, I'm a little jealous, because you're about to discover a truly terrific movie for the first time.
And, of course, we're going to make a whole evening out of it.
I'll be at the Lake Theater beginning at 6:00 p.m., an hour before the movie starts, selling and signing copies of both of my books. I'll have 40 Years, 40 Films, my autobiographical journey through four decades as a professional film critic, and my brand-new book, 40 Years, 40 Horror Films, from Eckhartz Press.
The new book is a loving tribute to my favorite genre, featuring extended essays about my favorite horror films from 1985 through 2025, my annual Top 10 horror lists, stories from my years hosting and moderating panels at Flashback Weekend Horror Convention, and plenty of memories about the filmmakers, actors, and fans who make horror so special.
There are well over 400 horror movies discussed throughout the book, and I'm especially proud that my friend Rich Koz, the legendary Svengoolie, wrote the Foreword.
Come by the lobby before the screening, say hello, pick up a book, and I'll be happy to sign and personalize it for you. We can take some pictures and talk movies, and I'll be signing books after the show as well.
Then, at 7:00 p.m., I'll introduce One False Move, we'll watch it together, and afterward I'll share some behind-the-scenes stories, do some trivia, and give away prizes, including movie passes and T-shirts.
That's what I love about these evenings. It's not just going to a movie. It's getting together with people who love movies, seeing something special on a big screen, talking about it afterward, and having a great time.
And in this case, it's also an opportunity to discover (or rediscover) one of the most underrated American crime thrillers of the 1990s.
So come on out:
Classic Cinemas Lake Theater in Oak Park
Wednesday, November 11th, at 7:00 p.m.
Carl Franklin's One False Move in a gorgeous 4K restoration.
You can get your tickets at classiccinemas.com/nick
Order a copies of my books HERE
If you love great thrillers, intelligent independent movies, terrific acting, and the kind of filmmaking that deserves to be discovered by new audiences, I really hope you'll join me.
One False Move is a genuinely great movie, and I can't wait to share it with everybody.
I'll see you at the Lake Theater on November 11th!
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