RPM

RPM

An abrasive cross between Chairman Of The Board and Simon Sez, RPM stars David Arquette as a wealthy ne'er-do-well who steals luxury cars when he's not inventing charming contraptions like a remote-control car designed to look up women's skirts. A pathetic pre-pubescent conception of a debonair playboy, down to the dispirited little dog that accompanies him on his adventures, Arquette is hired by an eccentric billionaire to travel to the French Riviera and steal a revolutionary super-car. But Arquette is not alone in his pursuit of the vehicle, as he's forced to compete with fellow thief Famke Janssen while romancing vaguely frightening kept woman Emmanuelle Seigner, whose performance lucidly illustrates why she's rarely cast in films not directed by paramour Roman Polanski. Shot largely on location and littered with attractive starlets, RPM should at least look good, but director Ian Sharp makes France resemble an ugly Hollywood backlot and Janssen and Seigner look like hideously animated wax dummies. Pairing some of the worst dubbing this side of Godzilla 2000 with dialogue that wouldn't pass muster in an Andy Sidaris movie, RPM is a monumentally unpleasant film that finds Arquette crafting the only character in existence less appealing than the screaming jackass he's played in countless commercials. RPM's script was co-written under a pseudonym by Performance co-director Donald Cammell, who committed suicide in 1996. Filmed in 1997 but understandably shelved for years, it's an embarrassing swan song to a career that never fulfilled the promise of Cammell's early work.

 
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