Protraph Lack of good storyline.

RipDelight This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

Adeel Hail Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Lachlan Coulson This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

bkoganbing What happens when a homicide is committed at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the Presidential Mansion, the White House? My own guess is that it would fall under the jurisdiction of the FBI. But they don't enter the picture here because guarding the president and his family falls under the purview of the Secret Service. I think the FBI would have first jurisdiction because the White House is federal property sitting on federal land, a murder in a Post Office would fall under the same rule.But when a White House staffer who's been having an affair with the president's son Tate Donovan is murdered and her body left in the public bathroom there, the Washington, DC homicide squad is called in. That would be Wesley Snipes and he's partnered with Secret Service liaison Diane Lane. They are called in by White House National Security Adviser Alan Alda who wants due diligence and as much help as possible in solving the murder. And of course he's got an interest in his president Ronny Cox and first lady Diane Baker not to mention the institution of the presidency itself.Snipes and Lane start pursuing one line of investigation, but soon get sidetracked into another because the clues given them don't quite pan out. While this is going on, the country and the president are involved in a hostage crisis with North Korea, another Pueblo like incident. And it turns out they are related.Murder At 1600 is a nice political thriller whose pace doesn't let up at all. There are two other good performances of note in it, Dennis Miller plays Snipes's laconic partner who acts a whole lot like comedian Dennis Miller. And Daniel Benzali plays one creepy head of the White House Secret Service detail.As for Alan Alda those of you who know and appreciate Alan Alda as Hawkeye Pierce from MASH, you will see an Alan Alda in this film who would probably have Hawkeye shot as a traitor.I recommend Murder At 1600 very highly, try to catch it when broadcast.

rtroy This film is based on a novel by Margaret Truman, daughter of President Harry Truman and First Lady Bess Truman. For some reason, she is not given credit here on IMDb for the work that this film is based on.As to the movie itself, I would agree that in certain ways it would be somewhat implausible, yet I still find it quite entertaining, and easy to watch any time it pops up on TV, these days in High Def, looking far better then it has in years. I like Wesley Snipes - persistent, a pain in the behind, never willing to give up with so much at stake. And I find that Diane Lane is at her best here - not trying to be attractive, yet amazingly so, showing that she can and ought to be an action adventure type of actor as much as any other type of work that she gets into. And after all the lies and other nonsense that has come out of the Nixon, Reagan and Dubya administrations, maybe this doesn't seem all that impossible after all.

canuckteach Finally caught this on Peachtree-TBS. I have to agree that the screenplay seems like it came off an assembly-line, and there are too many times where the viewers are asked to suspend their belief. Too bad, because the cast is excellent. I'm always glad to see Dennis Miller in a supporting role, and Daniel Benzali has a mesmerizing screen presence (he was the lead attorney on that highly-watchable 'Murder-One' TV show a few years back), but he is largely wasted here, muttering lines such as "You'll tell us if he tries to contact you?". Dan: you're the head of Security at the White House, you're supposed to know what's going' on. (Just ask the guys over at the Bourne Identity franchise).Also, we have a bumbling gang of Secret Service agents who keep letting their prey escape, the back door being the escapee's avenue of choice. A Tom Clancy novel this ain't.However, Wesley Snipes IS superb - he almost saves the day here. His Washington homicide cop is the only character that gets a bit of development. Nice chemistry between him and Diane Lane.And there's action, and some suspense. Despite the wooden story, I found it compelling that a pending conflict with North Korea serves as a background for the unfolding events. So, I watched it and didn't have a bad time... but I still think the character development and pure storytelling in almost any British TV detective show is 'heads n shoulders' above this. *sigh*

Robert J. Maxwell Spoiler here. A beautiful young woman is found murdered in a bathroom at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. (That's the White House.) There is a jurisdictional dispute between the Washington, DC, police force, represented by Wesley Snipes, and the Secret Service, represented by Diane Lane. Before you know it, the pair overcome their natural rivalry and work together. That both are harassed and told to lay off by their superiors is by now a cliché.Suspicion falls on the President's son. Too bad for the President (Ronnie Cox) because now he's got his jewels in a vice. The North Koreans are holding some American hostages, which the Prez wants to negotiate for. Standing against him and in favor of military force are some of the President's chiefs of staff and his adviser, Alan Alda. It is constantly asked of President Cox how, if he can't protect the people in his own residence, he can possibly protect the country? The words in this question make it sound like an insoluble dilemma, whereas the facts of the matter are probably that, yes, somebody can be slaughtered in the White House and the President can still do a good job of protecting the country, as long as he's not sabotaged by his subordinates. It's a kind of bumper-sticker question that, when examined, makes little sense, but to the appealing simplicity of which, many Americans seem attracted. Surrender is not an option, and all that.Well, you ask, did the president's kid kill the beauty? It looks bad. The son admits he slept with her an hour before her death, and a condom has been found with his semen and her fingerprints on it. (Yukk.) However, as Snipes and Lane find out, the entire murder was a ploy to get the president to choose between saving his son by resigning or playing out a hand with no cards left in it. The President is only a few minutes away from announcing his resignation when the dynamic duo of Snipes and Lane, having squirmed their way through the White House maze of underground tunnels, show up and shout, "Mister President, your son is innocent and here is the evidence on this secret tape!" Alan Alda was behind the whole thing. He wanted to go in with Special Forces or whatever it took to free the hostages, so he had the woman murdered and the son framed. Informed of this plot, the President, no namby-pamby after all, socks Alda in the jaw and puts him under arrest.It seems to me that the President himself, having been given information relevant to the murder and deliberately withholding it from the investigators is himself guilty of obstruction of justice, accessory after the fact, first degree broodiness, and parking in a handicapped zone. But no matter. We don't care if Presidents fail in every little observation of the law, as long as they keep their pants zipped. There's an intermediate heavy, a bald guy, whom I find always an irritation. He seems to enjoy being on camera too much. And he has this little shtick that he always does, looking humorless and speaking in a hoarse whisper, and that's that. You want to see what a real heavy can do with his role? Watch anything that John Glover is in.It's an entertaining and distracting movie as long as you don't think about it too much. Action scenes with shoot outs alternate with a plot development filled with intrigue. But there's not much to distinguish this from a dozen other similar movies, except that this one has to do with a murder in the White House. It's as if somebody, maybe a teen-aged Mickey Rooney, suddenly brightened and said, "Let's have a murder mystery, only this one will be in the White House!"