Grosse Pointe Blank

Contract killer Martin Blank (John Cusack) finds himself going home to Grosse Pointe, Detroit, for his high school reunion weekend. His shrink (Arkin) thinks it might help with his spiritual crisis. So does his secretary (Joan Cusack). And besides, there's a job in town. More to the point, maybe Debi (Driver) is ready to forgive him, ten years after he stood her up on prom night. Coming on the heels of Swingers and Palookaville, this hip black comedy is another droll study in the neuroses of the modern American male. As his name suggests, Blank is a void - his life has no meaning - but he thinks he's smart enough to get back on track, to buck those twin truisms: you can't go home again, and there are no second acts in American lives. Cusack is an engaging, lively actor with a keen sense of irony, and those qualities are much in evidence here. Director Armitage doesn't quite get the edge he brought to Miami Blues, but for what is essentially a one-joke movie, this has an awful lot going for it; not least the persuasive notion that psychiatrists all over America are being terrorised by angst-ridden hitmen intent on liberating their inner selves.