A Bruce Beresford film
Double Jeopardy
Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Ashley Jones, and Bruce Greenwood
Action, thriller

Double Jeopardy offers precisely the level of entertainment found in reading the jacket of one of those trashy paperbacks you see in the checkout aisle at the supermarket and will engage your attention for about as long. It has no subtlety, no shadings, and no suspense, and might as well not have a screenplay. It was directed by Bruce Beresford's evil twin.

Alas, this too is a blotch that's not coming off the ol' escutcheon any time soon.

That goes double for Ashley Judd, an intelligent, attractive actress who shouldn't have to settle for this kind of third-rate crap, and triple for a slumming Tommy Lee Jones (who gets first billing in the credits for about 30 minutes of screen time). To judge by his performance, he didn't even bother to show up for filming T just dusted off a few reels of his less-inspired outtakes from The Fugitive and told them to put the check in the mail. If you're a fan of either star, do yourself a favor and hit the rental store instead of shelling out $8 for this predictable drivel.

The plot, such as it is, revolves around Libby Parsons (Judd), a doting mother with a cute-as-a-button son, palatial waterfront digs, and what she thinks is a happy marriage. Her nasty hubby, Nick (Bruce Greenwood), however, is up to his ears in bad debts and has the four-alarm hots for Libby's best friend Angie (Annabeth Gish), besides. During a romantic sailboat getaway, he fakes his death, frames Libby, and whammo! she's in court. "I didn't do it," she says. "Let's consider the possibilities," the prosecutor sneers. "Was it pirates? Aliens?" On that rock-solid legal basis, Libby gets life in the big house for murder. While doing time, she learns the awful truth about no-good Nick and T wouldn't you know it T she's rarin' to balance the scales when she gets out.

Judd's undeniable charisma buoys a handful of scenes. She amusingly fends off the advances of a scruffy student in a library, and charmingly hassles an art gallery wonk and a BMW salesman into abetting her search for Nick. But the plain truth is that she's too darned easy on the eyes for half her scenes to fly. She makes her hip-hugging, form-fitting prison blues look like a GAP ad, and Libby actually appears younger and fresher after six years in the joint than she did going in. Her long-lost son bursts into tears when at last they're reunited and no wonder T you'd cry too if you were just getting a handle on puberty and it turned out your mom was Ashley Judd. Talk about Oedipal issues. Rated R for language, nudity, and some violence.

Rated R.