Claire Danes in Brokedown Palace (1999)

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When will moviemakers learn that simply copying a better movie and going through the motions will simply not cut it? Brokedown Palace is a cross between those leering, chintzy girls-in-prison movies (which are usually good for a quick thrill) and a serious drama that wants to propose issues about loyalty and roach-infested hellhole prisons. It is pretty sloppy on both counts.

When describing skills such as acting talent, skill of timing, and the ability to hold a scene, Claire Danes ranks right above an empty gumball machine and right below Pauly Shore covered with festering scabs. She has the market cornered on the vacant stare, and any drama that expects her to fit is begging for a swift death or a reviewer in a good mood. What we have here is just another annoying carbon-copy rip-off of a considerably better movie, even taking into account that Midnight Express is over 20 years old.

So dummy girl #1 (Danes) and dummy girl #2 (Kate Beckinsale) decide to tell everyone they're going to Hawaii, but really they go to THAILAND! (snicker giggle) So there they are, in Thailand. There are bugs and it is hot and they take pictures and drink alcohol and meet a guy. He screws one of them (the not-Claire Danes one) and then they fly to Hong Kong, only they unknowingly smuggle a large amount of illegal drugs in their luggage. (One thing that made me throw my shoe at the screen: If this 93-pound idiot was carrying an extra 8 pounds of drugs in her carry-on, she be leaning over farther than a $4 hooker at a midget convention.) Anyway, they're caught and they cry and get mad and call Daddy and a lawyer and they still can't get out.

So we have all these prison movie cliches paraded in front of us:

-Hey, the girls in prison aren't real friendly.

-Hey, the warden may take a bribe, but on the other hand she might get furious and get creative with a garden hose and some cottage cheese, so be careful.

-Hey, these swampland countries don't take kindly to fancy-pants Yankees thinking they're all superiors, even though these teen idols are forced to poop while squatting in a clay bowl full of mud.

-Hey, freedom comes from within and you can soar majestically over the mountains simply by having hope. Yeah sure, if you can forget the fact that you ate lice for breakfast and you have to use wicker tampons.

Poor Jonathan Kaplan. If this director’s career were a bar graph, it would look like the silhouette of a large, flaccid penis. Since The Accused, he's directed Immediate Family, Unlawful Entry, Bad Girls, and this dreck. Somehow Bill Pullman and Lou Diamond Philips show up and entertain for a bit, however briefly. And there is a cool scene where dummy #2's rich Daddy tears into Claire Danes and blames her for the whole fucked up mess. It was a nasty scene, and I would have liked some more nastiness. Nasty would have been nice.

What's to be said for a movie that aims to be another Return to Paradise? At least that one had Vince Vaughn and a hot lesbian in it! This is more like a prison movie-lite: Half the calories and a lot less filling. Recommended a little to any spoiled teenage girls, as a warning to say Thank You when Mommy pays her credit card bill. A final warning, for hardcore fans of prison movies: 1 prison + 2 actresses + this movie = Zero breasts. You have been warned.

Nudity Report: Danes and Beckinsale offer a few bikini shots at the hotel – before all hell breaks loose. The gals spend most of the movie dressed in what looks like burlap potato sucks, though less sexy than that description sounds.

IMDB Summary: 2,089 IMDb users rate this one at 6.1/10.

Box Office: Didn’t break $11 million at the North American box office.

DVD Info: Theatrical trailers, Widescreen transfer.


Written by: Scott Weinberg