" when you get out of jail , you can kill him . " starring ashley judd , tommy lee jones , bruce greenwood . rated r . double jeopardy is a lurid , prepostrous thriller that's also one of the year's most enjoyable . it's an uncompromisingly brutal , cheerfully anarchic , hyperactive actioner that has a mission and never diverts from it . there is not a moment here when the events on screen don't have a direct bearing on the plot ; once the film gets going it never stops . it has been branded as the female version of the fugitive and that's probably a correct assessment of the plot , but the film itself has little in common with the 1993 andrew davis/harrison ford collaboration besides the presence of star tommy lee jones . not even bothering with character introduction , director bruce beresford floors the gas pedal from the get-go and never finds the brake . we meet , rather hastily , libby and nick parsons ( ashley judd and bruce greenwood , respectively ) a seemingly happy married couple , with a son matty , age 4 . they go out on a sailboat one night , and after a period of some rockin' sex , they go to sleep . libby hears a strange noise , wakes up and discovers that she is covered with blood . she follows a red trail to the upper deck , where she finds a knife and , out of astonishment , picks it up . at that convenient moment , the coast guard shows up and libby is arrested . her lawyer , a friend , puts up a defense in court , but though we know she is innocent , the evidence against her is too compelling . her friend adopts her son and she goes to prison . once in prison , she makes a phone call to her friend . her friend gives her son the phone . nick walks in the room . little matty screams " daddy ! " the phone goes dead . libby realizes that the man she is imprisoned for killing isn't even dead . she gets some advice from a prisoner/former lawyer , who tells her that since the state already convicted her of killing her husband , they can't convict her of the same crime again , meaning that when she gets paroled she can kill him and they can't touch her . after a weirdly short amount of time , she gets out of parole . she is sent to live at a house with other recent parolees , under the command of parole officer travis lehman ( tommy lee jones ) . she sets out on a mission to find her husband and get her son back , which turns out to be much more difficult than anticipated . she winds up tracking him all the way to new orleans where she finds out that he has long killed his girlfriend and her son's " adopter " . double jeopardy is based on an assumption that is legally false . the law stating that nobody can be convicted twice for the same crime assumes that it is the same crime : same time , same place , same circumstances . it's not like it matters . this is a rollickingly good thriller ; intense , exciting , fast and furious . it's silly alright , but this is the kind of film you just don't question . in some films , plausibility is everything . double jeopardy , however , is not concerned with making sense : its sole purpose is to entertain , and it does . judd helps the film tremendously in a difficult role . this is her breakout box-office performance , and she is terrific . she brings some emotion to what could have been a one-dimensional role , giving the movie a little soul to go along with its effective chase scenes and action set pieces . tommy lee jones basically just reprises the role for which he won an oscar in the fugitive , but the movie makes good use of his stone-faced wit . thankfully , too , double jeopardy refrains from developing a romance between libby and travis ; a subplot which doubtlessly would have interfered with the film's story . this is one of those movies where cops are the bad guys , and i took a sort of sick pleasure in that . the sheer anarchy of the proceedings was nothing short of wonderful , as ashley judd kicks the crap out of every authority figure in the book . after all the idealistic hollywood features featuring hero cops , deft fbi agents and the virtues of the american legal system , it's great to see a movie that doesn't so much demonstrate their fallacy as it delights in their failure . double jeopardy is really good , but it isn't the kind of good that is remembered or recognized with awards . it's one of those movies better viewed with the brain turned off , otherwise , your brain will be busy ruining your experience . this is a thriller that isn't concerned with being smart or plausible . instead it diverts all attention to the action , which , this year , is second to none .
