Reversal of Fortune

10/19/19901h 51m

Theatrical (limited) Release (US)

~ The Case of Claus Von Bulow. An American Saga of Money and Mystery. ~

Overview:

Wealthy Sunny von Bülow lies brain-dead, husband Claus guilty of attempted murder; but he says he's innocent and hires Alan Dershowitz for his appeal.

Director:

Barbet Schroeder

Status:

Released

Language:

English

Buget:

$0.00

Revenue:

$15,445,131.00

Key words:

coma
based on novel or book
biography
murder
lawyer
based on memoir or autobiography
law student
socialite
legal drama
diabetes

Cast

Glenn Close

~ as ~

Sunny von Bülow / Narrator

Jeremy Irons

~ as ~

Claus von Bülow

Ron Silver

~ as ~

Alan Dershowitz

Annabella Sciorra

~ as ~

Sarah

Uta Hagen

~ as ~

Maria

Fisher Stevens

~ as ~

David Marriott

Jack Gilpin

~ as ~

Peter MacIntosh

Christine Baranski

~ as ~

Andrea Reynolds

Stephen Mailer

~ as ~

Elon Dershowitz

Christine Dunford

~ as ~

Ellen

View full cast & crew

Reviews (2)

JPV852
Written 4 year(s) ago
7
Great performance from Jeremy Irons, well deserving of his Best Actor Academy Award, kind of is a letdown as both a legal and character drama. Some nice moments and solid performances from everyone but not sure I'll remember this one down the road. 3.5/5
CinemaSerf
Written 2 year(s) ago
6
Quite why Jeremy Irons won an Oscar for this performance is anyone's guess. Though it is certainly one of his better efforts, he still comes across as remarkably wooden and un-engaging. His character - Klaus von Bulow - has just been convicted of attempting to marry his wealthy, socialite, wife Sonny (Glenn Close) by injecting her with drugs and leaving her to freeze to death on the bathroom floor (odd how they've got $14 million in the bank but never turn the central heating on!). Anyway, now she is lying in a coma and he is desperate so engages the services - at $300 a day, no less - of law professor Alan Dershowitz (upon whose book this is all based) to lead his appeal. It's history this, so if you're across the story then you will already know how it all pans out. Therefore what we are left with is a decent effort from Ron Silver as the tenacious lawyer, some almost ethereal contributions from Close as the occasionally animated corpse/narrator and the frankly underwhelming Irons. It's an interesting look at the drug-fuelled existence of the rich and famous and possibly not the best extolment of the state of marriage but somehow the whole thing is just a bit sterile, lacking, dry...