Out of Sight Cert 15 Dir Barry Sonnenfeld 140mins. I'M glad I'm not the only one who found the seduction scene in Barry Sonnenfeld's Out of Sight incredibly sexy.

Other reviews noted a quickening of the pulse as the mutual aural seduction of loveable crook George Clooney and federal marshal Jennifer Lopez was intercut with them slowly undressing, later on, in a hotel room. There was a hand on knee, a close up of a pupil dilating, a darting tongue moistening lips. I thought I was going to melt into my chair.

Those who panted through Sonnenfeld's sex, lies and videotape will not be surprised at this revelation. But so far, watching Mr Clooney seduce has been something only his legion of female fans have been able to imagine; there's been no hanky-panky for him in The Peacemaker, Batman and Robin or From Dusk Til Dawn. Scenes in ER and One Fine Day, with Michelle Pfeiffer, are mere embarrassed fumblings in the dark compared to what goes on between the two main protagonists in this Elmore Leonard adaptation.

Sonnenfeld is a master of what looks sexy on screen; this gradual tempting into the bedroom is far more titillating than, say, a water-sprayed Pammy Andy Lee swinging about with her boobs hanging out of a rubber dress at the start of Barb Wire. But this is just one (although pivotal) scene. What about the rest of the movie?

Leonard penned, among many other things, Get Shorty and Rum Punch, the book on which Tarantino's Jackie Brown was based. That pulp fiction style has been successfully recreated in these adaptations and Out of Sight is no exception; here is an incredibly stylish movie, both in the look and the direction.

Sonnenfeld has got the best from his cast too. Clooney is Jack Foley, a luckless-criminal tempted into one last job on his break from jail. He is becoming the Carey Grant of his generation; a loveable rogue, good-looking but always with a dodgy side. He convinces completely in the role. There is no doubt that he could look after himself in jail, mastermind a grand plan and have federal marshal Karen Sisco drooling all over him.

The pair meet when he kidnaps her during his jail-break. He lets her go but neither can stop thinking about the other and she vows to track him down for one reason or another. Lopez oozes sex appeal like honey dripping from a hive. She too manages to combine a number of opposing elements into her character; the single-mindedness of a woman in her job, the kinkiness of someone who fancies crooked types, and sensitivity as she realises that maybe Foley really is the one for her.

The chemistry between them is electric; if metaphors maybe dangerously mixed; this film, although based around guns and crime, is about sex. And how. Jeremy Austin

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