After con artist Joe Donan accidentally kills his father Mike during a sting when his blank bullets were replaced with live ammunition, he tries to carry out Mike's dying wish to recover "the cake". To do so he goes to find his uncle Lou. Uncle Lou, also a con artist, tries to get Joe in on one of his cons, but Joe falls in love with Lou's assistant's girlfriend Diane and decides that they will take the money from the con and run away. After the con goes wrong and Uncle Lou gets shot, Joe flees with the money but runs into his father, alive and well. Joe learns that Mike and Diane were working together to con Lou. Enraged, Joe fires his gun at Mike, not knowing whether the bullets inside were blanks or real. The bullet is a blank, and the film ends with Joe walking away from Mike.
Val Kilmer was initially cast to play the role of Joe. He left the film at the last minute because he apparently didn't get along with the producer. He instead did The Real McCoy. Christopher Coppola accused him of breaking his contract and leaving because he was offered $1 million for the other project. After he left, Trimark Pictures slashed the budget from $8 million to $3 million. After the budget was cut and the actors were paid, about $300,000 of the budget was left, which was actually supposed to go to Christopher Coppola. But he put it back into the production and didn't get a single cent.
When the film premiered, the lab made a mistake on the print and they double printed the awkward sex scene, meaning the scene played twice back to back. The studio didn't bother checking the print.
Critical reception
The movie received negative reviews from critics. Kevin Thomas described it as "a hopelessly callow, leaden-paced attempt at film noir."[1]
The film holds a 0% "Rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 5 reviews.[2]
Star Michael Biehn called this one of the worst films he ever made.[3]
