I think this must be a horror movie, since:
-
the photography is so dark, they must all be vampires
-
written on the DVD box are the three scariest words in the
English language: "starring Eric Roberts"
Um, let's see. Superman (Dean Cain) has a brother who
borrows his car and rips off some stolen electronics. The guy who
originally stole the merchandise (Eric Roberts) is pretty hacked off,
especially since he had taken the electronic components out of the VCRs and
replaced them with 2.5 million dollars in cash. By the way, Roberts'
character name sounds like it should be in a Monty Python sketch. His name
is Vic Haddock. Anyway, Eric sees the car fleeing the scene,
researches the owner, and assumes that Superman pulled off the rip-off.
Well, about at this time, a mysterious new woman comes
into Superman's life, and they seem to be hitting it off quite well, until
she overhears the brother say that he borrowed the car that night. Then
she decides to sleep with the brother. During their liaison. who should
show up but Julia Roberts' favorite brother, and he kills Superman's brother.
You've probably already figured out from the preceding sentences that the
girl was actually working for Big Eric all along, hence her switch to the
brother when she figured out who really stole the VCRs.
That part of the movie was a pretty damned good noir,
atmospheric and mysterious, and they didn't immediately reveal the
connection between the girlfriend and the crime, so they really had you
wondering why this sweet girlfriend was suddenly making a play for the
brother. That should have been the end of the movie.
Unfortunately it wasn't. That was only a third of the way
through.
The rest of the movie hinged on the rather lame premise
that the girl had actually fallen in love with The Man of Steel, despite
having participated in the murder of his brother. Hoo-boy, does this make
Eric mucho jealous, so he shadows them for years as they fall in love and
get married and have a child and start to get gray.
All along Superman is still wondering just exactly why his
brother was brutally murdered, so he finally gets around to hiring a detective, and he really
isn't too pleased when he finds out that his wife first screwed the
brother and then set up his death. That's gotta hurt.
Years go by. Continents shift. They resolve it somehow,
but I can't say how. I wouldn't want to spoil the ending for you. Actually
the ending is OK, as were the first thirty minutes. The middle hour seemed longer than the Hundred Years War,
and that accounts for the pathetically low score at IMDb.
For some reason, the discontinuation of the title has
pushed the price of a used DVD into astronomical heights. While No Alibi
is not as bad as the IMDb score might indicate, you simply have too much
money if you pay forty bucks or more to obtain it.
