Truth or Consequences, N.M. (1997)

Derivative, preening, pointless, wantonly and obsessively violent. Working from a script so hackneyed, a character actually says, ''S--- happens.'' Have I left anything out? Maybe only this: This fake Western/gangster movie is god-awful. For his feature-directing debut, Kiefer Sutherland celebrates the moronic love between a simpleton parolee (Vincent Gallo from Palookaville) and his credulous girlfriend (Kim Dickens from ditto) whose plans to do one more robbery and then go straight go bad, putting the couple on the run in the Southwest. Along the way, for no developed reason, they pick up a couple of yuppie hostages (Kevin Pollack and Grace Phillips). And for no further developed reason, the loser lovers are abetted by a couple of loser accomplices, including...Kiefer Sutherland. Which means Sutherland the actor's penchant for playing coked-up, psychopathic lowlifes, an act so used up in the wake of An Eye for an Eye that you may want to shoot yourself rather than have to watch Sutherland wave a gun crazily at anyone ever again. To paraphrase one of the posse's description of Sutherland's character, Truth or Consequences, N.M. is as bad as they come. F

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