Something happened to Denzel Washington in the mid-1990s - it's as if he decided to do his best and worst work simultaneously. Co-starring with a (then unknown) Russell Crowe in Virtuosity (1995) has to count as one of his worst efforts. it's tempting to put all the blame on Brett Leonard, who had done The Lawnmower Man (not exactly a good sign of what's up ahead). Crowe is a vicious serial killer named SID 6.7 but SID is a computer program used by the police to train themselves. Given Crowe's future brilliance what happened??!??
Here I can only offer a two-prolonged attack that MAY explain this disaster. One - apprently Leonard - notice this are the sheer PHYSICAL problems in having Denzel Washington face=off against Sid. This is not Gladiator and Crowe (because he is) looks SMALLER and WEAKER than Denzel's more muscular and taller character making the conflict seem absurd - like a midget fighting a heavy weight champ. To be sure, SID has more power but, cinematically, the film doesn't look good - literally, the colors, costumes, and the like don't meld nicely.
Secondly, and no one can be blamed here but the major problem the film is genre. Thanks to Silence of the Lambs, the studios went beserk in pumping out serial-killer movies that soon lost any novelty. Unless one has a brilliant script there's no point in trying. It's painfully obvious the movie is trying for some edgy, cross-genre of sci-fi and serial killing but this is not Total Recall or even Robocop, it's just an empty thrill-fest and Crowe's SID brings nothing to the table.
My own guess is that Denzel and his people thought the script was OK and any problems could be hammered out. Big mistake. Not a total waste of time but given he talents present, it's a crime that Washington and Crowe couldn't be given something better to do. Still, it's not a complete disaster. Crowe looks OK in a kimono. And that's all there is to say about this lamentable exercise.
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