a5c7b9f00b A 25 year old female White House staffer, Carla Town, is murdered in the White House. D.C. homicide detective Regis is assigned to investigate, only to find evidence suppressed by the Secret Service. After suspecting a cover-up, Regis convinces Secret Service Agent Nina Chance to assist in uncovering the truth. The President's son Kyle Neil is a prime suspect, as he was having sex with Carla within an hour of her murder. While the investigation ensues, the President, Jack Neil, is holding meetings with top military personnel regarding North Korea's holding 23 U.S. military personnel hostage. Regis confronts top Secret Service Agent Spikings at his home shortly after Spikings returns with evidence leading to the murder. The home is attacked and Spikings is killed, but Regis makes it out alive with Agent Chance's assistance, and with the evidence tape. White House adviser Jordan presents false evidence to the President that his son killed Carla and forces the President to say he will announce his resignation at 10 p.m. the following day. Regis and Chance break into the White House via underground tunnels, stop the President from resigning, and arrest Jordan for conspiracy to murder. Jordan pulls a gun, injures Agent Chance, and is killed by multiple Secret Service agents. A news briefing states there were false rumors of the President resigning, and also falsely state that Agent Spikings was killed in the gunfire exchange between Jordan and the Secret Service.
D.C. detective Harlan Regis is called to the White House after a young woman is murdered in the White House. Regis realizes this won't be a typical investigation as he keeps running into a brick wall with the Secret Service. He is only able to get the help of Agent Chance. All of this is occurring while a hostage scandal in Korea threatens to destroy the President's term.
My Take: Has the potential of being at least mindlessly exciting, but rarely reaches it. <br/><br/>After just releasing the Clint Eastwood vehicle ABSOLUTE POWER, MURDER AT 1600 is released with practically the same plot. A murder happens to take place in the white house, it happens to be a women, there's the cop who believes the case breaks when the case breaks and suspects happen to be the President and his Chief-of-Staffs. MURDER AT 1600 isn't new film, as it is built upon ideas and storyline from other films. The plot is an interesting virtuoso, with some interesting plot twists and revelations, but it doesn't really grab you. It's interesting but not totally engaging.<br/><br/>Wesley Snipes however is in fine form as a cop Harlan Regis, a cop who's assigned to investigate a murder that happens to take place at the White House. The Secret Service fails to capture the murderer, but decides that they close the case immediately, dismissing that the murderer is the victim's old boyfriend, but Regis thinks otherwise. Regis, with a little help from Secret Service agent and award-winning sharpshooter Nina Young (Diane Lane, also pretty good), tries to get on top of the case, with suspects that include the president's son (Tate Donovan), the White House staff and President Neil (Ronny Cox) himself.<br/><br/>The climax and the conclusion has a few surprises, and there are a number of very good performances, but this is still fairly pedestrian territory. It's not especially exciting, with lack of some action, and the plot gets pretty confusing as it goes. Director Dwight Little isn't quite the professional when it comes to the action scenes. The plot is familiar, but the writers do their best to confuse us to make the plot seem like new material. Where's the fun in that? MURDER AT 1600 is not a bad thriller, and the film promises some few good scenes and a fine lead by Snipes, but with more potential than they got, it could have been better.<br/><br/>Rating: **1/2 out of 5.
made my dog start hyperventilating and gave her enough adrenalin to lope up the steep staircase to the bedroom, where we were watching this Wesley Snipes/Diane Lane mystery. Stroking and petting the canine helped me accept some of the implausibility of the story, and I watched it to the end.<br/><br/>When it seemed that the First Son was the killer, I tossed out the opinion that maybe it was the First Lady, reasoning that some clever screenwriter stole the idea from Presumed Innocent. Pam guessed Alan Alda, but I thought that there were too many cold eye characters to settle on one. It was when Ronny Cox, Alda and a bunch of military types tried to decide whether to drop a few bombs on North Korea and start a war that my focus became clear. The writers were not channeling Absolute Power, but rather Seven Days in May. Kirk, Burt and Freddie March did it better, but they didn't have this DC Detective backstory to gum up the works. You know something is wrong with the writing when the running joke about eviction goes nowhere.<br/><br/>Despite these problems, Snipes held my interest, the dog settled down, the rain let up and it finished in time to let me see the last three minutes of the Pistons-Heat game.
The convoluted plot unfolds mechanically and with little atmosphere as if sex and death in the Oval Office would provide enough gravity on its own. That it doesn't is a sign of mediocre filmmaking as well as a measure of just how cynical the times have become.