Best movie of this year hands down!

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

An Exercise In Nonsense

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

This watchable "wrong man" drama is probably the highlight of Tom Selleck's less than impressive movie career. Okay, so prison movies are ten-a-penny these days but this one is well made and has some unpleasant moments to stop it becoming just another television-made movie-of-the-week. Tom Selleck is a likable, lightweight lead who you actually care about and his various obstacles in prison - while admittedly clichéd - are quite frightening. From the bullying racists to the rapes in the showers and the wise old inmates (an excellent turn from F. Murray Abraham), everything is present and correct here. One moment has Selleck taking on a chief opponent as he plans to knife him in the toilets and is totally gripping.Outside of prison, things are less interesting, with a worthy but unmemorable actress playing Selleck's girlfriend who sticks by him through thick and thin. The introduction of two corrupt cops, a kind of 'bad' Starsky and Hutch if you will, sets the sense for an implausible climax which sees Selleck suddenly become a fearless action man and do lots of stunts. Cool, but hardly believable. Overall, AN INNOCENT MAN is a fine thriller with a good central premise and an adequate execution - and it makes a nice evening's family entertainment.

One of the best prison movies ever! Selleck is very good and Abraham as the hardened con is excellent.The worst premise: how do you prove you are innocent ...Dirty cops high on coke made a fatal error and enter the wrong home. An innocent man is shot; arrested; and imprisoned.His life is ruined. His life will never be the same again. Prison life is hell.What does a man of integrity and character do in prison, unjustly accused??!!His wife is obsessed with proving his innocence.So compelling ... in my husband's top 10 of all time!

This movie is a great example of a character thrust into an awful situation - a situation where you question, "What would I do in his shoes?" For that reason, it is very tense and suspenseful throughout as Tom Selleck's character tries to navigate prison life. I really felt for his character - his acting was great. Sure, there are some moments of cheesy lines and overdone composing and a bit of over-acting by the various villains, but for the most part, this is one of the better character thrillers I've seen in awhile. Selleck is great, as if the man who befriends him inside the prison. Can't find anything new to watch? I recommend checking out this little gem from 1989!

The name Peter Yates is not bandied around a great deal amongst movie fans, which is quite surprising since he is the director who brought us such fondly remembered classics as Summer Holiday, Bullitt and The Hot Rock. Yates is also behind the camera on this Tom Selleck vehicle, but there's little here to remind one of the halcyon days of his earlier classics. If anything, An Innocent Man has about it the air of a competent but totally uninspired made-for-TV prison drama (in actual fact, this is not a TV-movie but a major big-screen release, complete with relatively big stars). It is not a bad film, merely one that never rises above mediocrity at any point.Airline mechanic Jimmie Rainwood (Tom Selleck) leads a normal life. He works nine-to-five like any ordinary citizen, pays his bills, and loves his wife Kate (Laila Robins). His existence is shattered when two narcotics cops mistakenly raid his house and shoot him. The cops, Mike Parnell (David Rasche) and Danny Scalise (Richard Young), have been holding back drugs from some of their busts and selling them privately for big bucks. They were only in Rainwood's house because of an address mix-up linked to another bust. Fearing their profitable scam might be exposed unless they take drastic action, Scalise and Parnell plant narcotics in Rainwood's house and make it look like they were there on a legitimate raid. As a result, Jimmie is convicted of a crime he never committed and sent to a tough penitentiary for several years. While her husband is inside, Kate works tirelessly to clear his name, bringing in honest cop John Fitzgerald (Badja Djola) to investigate her suspicions of police corruption. But it's a slow process, and in the meantime Jimmie must learn to survive in the dangerous prison environment. A tough, experienced convict called Virgil Cane (F. Murray Abraham) teaches him how to cope, but Rainwood's peaceful life prior to imprisonment makes him struggle to adapt to his new surroundings. After many hardships – including having to kill a prison bully – Jimmie is finally released. Hardened by his experience, he sets out to track down the dirty duo that set him up in the first place.There's nothing hugely wrong with the basic story (scripted by Larry Brothers) other than the fact that it is somewhat familiar. The problems with An Innocent Man are more to do with issues regarding the general handling of the film. In the acting stakes no-one gives a really strong performance; in the music department Howard Shore provides a bland, lazy score; photographically the film is totally conventional and "play-safe"; and in the directing stakes, Yates goes about his job in strictly by-the-numbers fashion. When thinking about the film afterwards, words like "inconsequential", "unmemorable", "unremarkable" and "routine" spring to mind. Nothing about it stands out in a good nor bad way – it's just typical 5-out-of-10 fodder from first frame to last. One of the main purposes of the film seems to be to give the star a more hard-edged role than usual, but apart from dollops of foul language and extra fake blood during the fighting sequences, it's still Tom Selleck playing Tom Selleck. An Innocent Man is easy to watch - it's even easier to forget.