Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

As the story unfolded, I assumed I was watching the filmization of a Ross Macdonald novel. All the characteristics and typical Ross Macdonald touches were there - from the snappy dialogue (when asked to My Night With Maud, the hero replies that seeing a Rohmer film is like watching paint dry; when asked to share the tub with a Hollywood hot-light, the hero replies that he'll keep it in mind for when he's feeling really dirty; when the hero asks Paula, as a plane lands outside the cabin, "Is that Tom now?", she comes back, "It isn't Lindberg!") to the technique of using a multi-stranded, multi-plotted detective story to pull away seamy layer after seamy layer of Los Angeles "society". It's a world in which nobody is as friendly as they seem on the surface, where the thickly-veiled threat is often followed through by naked action. And as too in Ross Macdonald, the plot is damned difficult to follow, part of the reason for this being that it is not regarded as all that important, merely a means to sociological and anthropological ends. I've seen the film twice now and I still can't follow it and it still doesn't make sense. However to judge it on the shortcomings of the plot, is to do the film a grave disservice. It's the characters and the atmosphere that count, Night Moves assembles some great characters, very cleverly and skillfully played and creates a powerful atmosphere abetted by the sharp location shooting by Bruce Surtees, the music score, and the film industry background that runs underneath it all. Yes, Night Moves is a film to see yet a third time!OTHER VIEWS: A confused and confusing plot, realistically acted, but - aside from one or two moments - directed in a disappointingly ordinary fashion. I expected a lot more drama from Arthur Penn. True, there's a bit of exciting action, but it's smothered under reams of dull talk. The photography is deliberately low-key.

Cited by many critics as one of the best and most important American movies of the 1970s, Arthur Penn's Night Moves hasn't stood the test of time in terms of popularity. The legacy of the nouvelle vague in France had inspired a whole generation of American film-makers to try new things, and to subvert genres as much as the studios would allow them. This led to a re-emergence of the film noir, a genre stuck very much in the 1940s and 50s. With its chain-smoking, loose- skinned leading men and devilish, glamorous ladies, its tough demeanour is very much a product of the time. A couple of decades later, and filmmakers such as Roman Polanski, with Chinatown, and Robert Altman, with The Long Goodbye, found new ways to explore this dark world and its shady characters, and are widely remembered for it. But no film has been as successful at cutting to the heart of what drives these self- loathing deadbeats and the manipulating bombshells distracting them as Arthur Penn's Night Moves.Private investigator and former American football star Harry Moseby (Gene Hackman) works freelance, preferring to gulp down coffees during long stakeouts on his own time than to be on the payroll of a larger agency. His wife Ellen (Susan Clark) tries to shake him out of his stubborn ways, but he's just an old-fashioned sort of guy. This lone wolf approach is in his blood, as after he turns down Ellen's invitation to the cinema, he monitors the situation anyway, discovering that his wife is having an affair in the process. Meanwhile, former actress Arlene Iverson (Janet Ward) hires Harry to track down her missing, promiscuous daughter Delly (Melanie Griffith). A conversation with mechanic Quentin (James Woods) leads Harry to a thrill-seeking movie stuntman, and then to the Florida Keys, where he discovers Delly hiding out with her stepfather Tom Iverson (John Crawford), and a striking woman named Paula (Jennifer Warren).As a straight-forward detective story, Night Moves will likely divide an audience. With its unhurried approach and eagerness to explore Harry's troubled home-life and self-destructive behaviour, the jarring tones may not suit everybody's tastes. Night Moves is much more about the character than the case he is on. The movie mainly succeeds in this balancing act because of the performance of Gene Hackman, an actor working at the very top of his game. In the 70s, he was part of a group of actors who rebelled against Hollywood gloss, and portrayed real people in real situations. Harry is ultimately a good-hearted guy, tragically failing to see the irony when he demonstrates his knowledge of 'check mate' moves in chess to Paula, with sight of own possible fate in the unravelling mystery. As the plot moves on and Harry finds himself caught up in far more than he had bargained for, the revelations become increasingly confusing. But I didn't care: It's the kind of convolution warmly embraced by the Coen Brothers in neo-noir The Big Lebowski. It isn't a masterpiece, but Night Moves deserves to be remembered as one of the most important American movies of its decade.

One of the great American films of the 70s and would be generally recognized as such if it weren't so confusing. Hackman as a private detective with problems of his own (naturally) and a simple new case (find the runaway girl). He finds the girl easily but complications ensue. If you watch this film pay very close attention to everything. One of its charms --and frustrations-- is that nothing is as it seems. Everyone in it is 'acting' in their perceived self-interest but their perceptions about that are mostly wrong. Hackman is terrific. The film has a zillion things going for it but might be as flawed as its subject matter. Set in LA and the Florida Keys it's a sunny but blindingly bleak view of the mid-70s. Stunning work by Arthur Penn.

First class stinker way below the talents of Gene Hackman and the rest of the cast.The plot is not to be believed. How could any mother, even a drunken one, react to the death of her 16 year old daughter like that? Calling the deceased a bitch was way over-the-top. Seems as though nearly everyone in the film was either involved in the murder or caught up by the original murder which led to the death of the 16 year old.As the guy who fixes more than cars, James Woods turned in a decent performance. Susan Clark plays the detective's (Gene Hackman) wife who is neglected and falls into the arms of another man.The ending scene where practically gets it is totally unrealistic.