Pretty Poisonby Anonymous

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August 16, 2008: Dennis Pitt, an emotionally disturbed arsonist prone to fantasizing, is released from a mental institution and ventures out into the real world, where he tries to impress Sue Ann, a high-school blonde with a baby doll face, by pretending to be a spy for the CIA. At the time of Pitt's release from the asylum his doctor admonished him to stop fantasizing because there is no room for it in the real world. It turns out, though, that the real world contains even crazier and more dangerous psychopaths than do the madhouses. &quot Pretty Poison&quot has a fascinating premise and it would have been a far better movie, had the direction not been so flat and uninspired. The noir movie wannabe is slow-paced and fails to build any significant suspense or thrills, which is out of joint with its subject matter and genre. Anthony Perkins and Tuesday Weld, on the other hand, turn in well-honed performances as psychopaths, and, oddly enough, of the two, Weld comes off as the scarier.