The Movie:

Malicious is a pretty mediocre film that's basically a remake of Play Misty For Me and the only reason anyone seems to care about the film at all is because Molly Ringwald has a topless scene in it. That said, a topless Molly Ringwald is not a bad thing and even if we see the ending coming a mile away, the movie is at least moderately entertaining even if it isn't actually very good.

Doug Gordon (Patrick McGaw of The Basketball Diaries) is a college baseball hopeful currently dating a cute girl named Laura (Sarah Lassez recently of Mad Cowgirl). Things are looking good for Doug until he screws up one night and finds himself having a one night stand with Melissa Nelson (Molly Ringwald), a self professed fan of Doug's baseball abilities. Once their little fling is over, Doug tries to put it all behind him and move on with his life but Melissa has other plans. She invents a fictitious relationship involving the two of them and soon proves to be completely off her rocker.

When Sarah returns to Doug's arms Melissa becomes insanely jealous and starts acting a little odd. She tries to break them up a few times and finally decides if she can't have him then no one will, and she makes an attempt on his life. Doug becomes concerned that Melissa might try and harm Sarah, a suspicion that becomes even more frightening when it turns out that the unknowing Sarah has just taken on Melissa, using an alias, as her new roommate! Doug finds himself between a rock and a hard place, wrestling with confessing to Sarah what happened between he and Melissa and trying to get out of this situation by making as little mess as possible but Melissa's not going to let him go without a fight and even the police may not be able to help the poor guy.

Everything about Malicious is average. The performances aren't great, but neither are they horrible. The story is predictable and derivative but it is at least entertaining. The direction isn't flashy but it is effective and the cinematography isn't going to blow your mind but they movie looks okay. It's all very much a middle of the road affair and the only reason at all that this film is known is because of Ringwald's nude scene. So, let's talk about that scene. Molly gets doodled on a boat and we see her sweater-meat. That's it. The scene is fairly brief and it isn't particularly explicit, but if you're wanting to know if she takes it off (let's face it, The Breakfast Club, Pretty In Pink and Sixteen Candles affected a lot of different people in a lot of different ways...) rest assured you will see her hooters and unlike the film, they're actually above average.

McGaw makes for a reasonably likeable lead even if he isn't the most enthusiastic performer to ever get stalked by a crazy chick. Eastwood and Douglas did it better, but in their defense they had more to work with. While it was obviously unethical of him to cheat on his loyal girlfriend, he doesn't deserve the Hell that Ringwald's character puts him through so in that respect he's marginally sympathetic. The biggest problem with the film is just that we've seen it all before and we've seen it done better than it's done here. Malicious doesn't do anything that Play Misty For Me, Fatal Attraction or even The Crush didn't do before.

Video:

The 1.33.1 fullframe picture is obviously a pan and scan hack job (though the menu screens are anamorphic widescreen) as there are more than a few scenes where the sides and tops of people's heads are missing! Framing aside, image quality is average at best. Some edge enhancement is noticeable and there's a little bit of grain here and there. Mpeg compression isn't an issue and the detail levels aren't as bad as you might think, but really, the framing hurts the movie quite a bit and the compositions are obviously off.