Highly overdone thriller with a slew of sub-plots that confuse instead of enhance the story that in the end seems like a big wast of time, unless you see it for it's unintentional comedic values.
A bank robbery ten years ago in Brooklyn NY to steal an expensive ruby from a safe deposit box goes astray when one of the crooks ends up stealing it from his fellow robbers. A short time later strolling with his eight year old daughter, Elisabeth (Brittany Murphy) on the subway he's chased beaten and thrown to the tracks, by the crooks whom he double-crossed, where he's then run over by a train and killed before the eyes of his terrified daughter. Just before Elisabeth's dad is buried in Potter's Field his daughter puts her doll, Miska, in the Coffin with him not knowing that he hid the sought after ruby in it.
Ten years later the crooks who killed her father, who were arrested on the scene and sentenced, are released from jail. The first thing that they do is go looking for Elisabeth to get the number of the grave that here father is buried in to get a hold of the ruby. Now how does Michael Douglas, Dr. Nathan Conrad, come in to all this? It seems that Dr. Conrad is a top hot shot psychiatrist who's associated with the mental hospital where Elisabeth is a patient. This is after she recognized one of the crooks who killed her father and went bananas and slashed him to death.
The crooks want Dr. Conrad to find out from Elisabeth the number of her fathers grave by him getting her to talk to him. To make sure that Dr. Conrad cooperates they kidnap his eight year old daughter Jessie, Skye McCole, so that he gets the massage. The movie "Don't say a word" goes on with at least a dozen more sub-plots that would take a good size book to explain them all. The final scene in Potter's Field goes on for what seems to be an eternity.Under normal conditions you should have concern and sympathy for Dr. Conrad his wife and daughter, as well as young Elisabeth, but you just can't. The movie is so contrived that the characters didn't seem real so why even bother to care about them.
The most absurd part in the movie, with so many absurd parts, was the hard as nails, all pampered and polished, detective Sandra Cassidy, Jennifer Esposito. Cassidy in the end of the film takes on the whole batch of hardened criminals single-handedly without even bothering to call or wait for back-up. Even "Dirty Harry" Callahan wouldn't do that and ends up wiping out almost all of them! even after taking a bullet in her gut! Cassidy is so though that she seems ready to get back on duty the next morning! And to think that there are some people who say that women can't cut it as policemen.
A bank robbery ten years ago in Brooklyn NY to steal an expensive ruby from a safe deposit box goes astray when one of the crooks ends up stealing it from his fellow robbers. A short time later strolling with his eight year old daughter, Elisabeth (Brittany Murphy) on the subway he's chased beaten and thrown to the tracks, by the crooks whom he double-crossed, where he's then run over by a train and killed before the eyes of his terrified daughter. Just before Elisabeth's dad is buried in Potter's Field his daughter puts her doll, Miska, in the Coffin with him not knowing that he hid the sought after ruby in it.
Ten years later the crooks who killed her father, who were arrested on the scene and sentenced, are released from jail. The first thing that they do is go looking for Elisabeth to get the number of the grave that here father is buried in to get a hold of the ruby. Now how does Michael Douglas, Dr. Nathan Conrad, come in to all this? It seems that Dr. Conrad is a top hot shot psychiatrist who's associated with the mental hospital where Elisabeth is a patient. This is after she recognized one of the crooks who killed her father and went bananas and slashed him to death.
The crooks want Dr. Conrad to find out from Elisabeth the number of her fathers grave by him getting her to talk to him. To make sure that Dr. Conrad cooperates they kidnap his eight year old daughter Jessie, Skye McCole, so that he gets the massage. The movie "Don't say a word" goes on with at least a dozen more sub-plots that would take a good size book to explain them all. The final scene in Potter's Field goes on for what seems to be an eternity.Under normal conditions you should have concern and sympathy for Dr. Conrad his wife and daughter, as well as young Elisabeth, but you just can't. The movie is so contrived that the characters didn't seem real so why even bother to care about them.
The most absurd part in the movie, with so many absurd parts, was the hard as nails, all pampered and polished, detective Sandra Cassidy, Jennifer Esposito. Cassidy in the end of the film takes on the whole batch of hardened criminals single-handedly without even bothering to call or wait for back-up. Even "Dirty Harry" Callahan wouldn't do that and ends up wiping out almost all of them! even after taking a bullet in her gut! Cassidy is so though that she seems ready to get back on duty the next morning! And to think that there are some people who say that women can't cut it as policemen.