DISCLOSURE (1994) **

Disclosure was the third installment of a loose trilogy of films where Michael Douglas gets in trouble by thinking with his dick.  (Fatal Attraction and Basic Instinct being the other two.)  At least in this one he does his best not to think with the little head.  Even though he tries to resist his basic instincts, he still winds up in hot water. 

Douglas plays Tom, a worker at a tech company who is passed over for a promotion.  His boss (Donald Sutherland) gives the job to the young and sexy Meredith (Demi Moore).  Since she and Tom used to be an item, Meredith invites him up to her office after hours for some wine to celebrate and catch up on old times.  She tries her best to seduce him, and when Tom rebuffs her advances, Meredith claims he sexually assaulted her and sets out to ruin his life. 

This was based on a novel by Michael Crichton, and it was made at a time when Hollywood was busy adapting a lot of his stuff.  (Jurassic Park just came out the year before.)  I never read the book, but as far as the movie goes, it’s more convincing when it’s focusing on the backstabbing politics of tech companies than portraying how men and women really interact.  Even by ‘94’s standards the whole “shoe is on the other foot” argument of women being predators in the workplace felt hollow and gimmicky.  Barry Levinson’s slick but mundane direction also helps to keep the audience at length from the material. 

A fine movie on the subject of sexual harassment in the workplace could’ve been made with this cast and director.  Sadly, it just becomes a jumping off point to a lame corporate intrigue plot line, one that gets kind of loopy the longer it goes on.  The dated high-tech concepts of virtual reality and email are good for some laughs now though.  The scene where Douglas is in a VR version of cyberspace and is menaced by a hilariously awful looking digitized avatar of Moore is ten pounds of stupid in a five-pound bag.  Even funnier is the moments where there is a shot of a computer and the score slides into this computer-y “Boop, Beep, Boop” sort of noise as if to say, “TECHNOLOGY!”  (It’s kind of sad that the music was by none other than Ennio Morricone!)

Moore is good as the icy cold temptress, but I honestly have to say Douglas has been better.  Some of his dialogue scenes are reminiscent of a Lifetime movie, and you just never really buy him as a victim.  Maybe a put upon Everyman just isn’t in his wheelhouse.  This was also made at the time when Dennis Miller was popping up in every movie.  Unfortunately, he seems reined in here as he doesn’t get to go off on any of his patented pop culture-fueled rants.