In 1880's Cuba Luis Vargas, Banderas, the owner of a prosperous coffee export business heads towards the docks of Havana to welcome his mail order bride. He doesn't believe in love but he needs a wife. However she's not at all what he expected. The Julia Russell he anticipated has transformed from quite a plain photo into Angelina Jolie. Of course he falls heavily in love and can't quite cope when he realises that his new bride has scarpered with a significant proportion of his loot. He hires a private detective, Thomas Jane, to hunt her down so he can exact revenge.
Original Sin is a really really stupid film. It's full of heaving bosoms and lust-ridden eyes and lines like, "She ran away because she didn't believe she was worthy of love." It's hard for Banderas to bring dignity to this role and as for Angelina Jolie, what does she think she's doing? First an Oscar, then Lara Croft and now Original Sir.
The film looks handsome enough but director Michael Cristofer's adaptation of Cornell Woolrich's crime novel, Truffaut tried it over thirty years ago with Mississippi Mermaid, fails to hit the mark on either the crime, or the romance, or anything much else.
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