Fashion, murder, sex, and revenge are tucked into the sands of HOURGLASS. But even those elements don't enliven this tale of a selfish playboy who meets his downfall at the hands of a vengeful lesbian.
Buying up the stock of outclassed rivals like Jurgen Brauner (Timothy Bottoms), fashion house scion Michael Jardine (C. Thomas Howell) overextends his company in order to steamroll a sweet deal with Japanese backers.
Stamping himself in the mold of his stroke-ridden father, Henry (Terry Kiser), and entrusting too much flexibility to his alcoholic brother, Jimmy (Anthony Clark), Michael sinks into a sex-mad vortex after spotting Dara Jensen (Sofia Shinas), who has been provocatively placed in his path by his
assistant, Kami (Colette O'Connell).
Distracted by sex games, Michael becomes the prime suspect in the slaying of his ex-wife, Nancy. Although Michael's also implicated in the throat-slashing murder of his gay associate, David (Johnny Venokur), he tunes out reality even after he blows his Japanese deal by pursuing Dara.
After Dara drugs him so she and her playmates can disgrace him in his sick father's bedroom, Michael discovers that Jimmy has jeopardized company stock put up for collateral. With his empire collapsed, his dad hospitalized, and Jimmy slain, Michael now learns he has been set up for a fall. Dara is
a lesbian whose father killed himself after being squeezed out of business by Henry Jardine. Managing to toss Kami out the window, beleaguered Michael takes the fall for several murders, all of which have been committed by Dara, but survives his ordeal by spending his jail time plotting revenge.
HOURGLASS is like a home movie by survivors of the Hollywood Brat Pack, with a musical score that pierces the eardrums and showy cameos by the likes of Kiefer Sutherland. Director-star Howell is a perpetual teen sent to do a leading man's work, and would-be vamp Sofia Shinas has a face that
wouldn't launch a leaky canoe, let alone a thousand ships. Rounding out the egregious ensemble is eye-popping Bottoms, who seems to eschew acting in favor of having nervous breakdowns onscreen. (Graphic violence, extreme profanity, extensive nudity, sexual situations, substance abuse.)
