SnoopyStyle Eddie Kasalivich (Keanu Reeves) is an undergraduate at the University of Chicago. He's a machinist on the Hydrogen Energy Project led by Paul Shannon (Morgan Freeman). Eddie is able to perfect the machine and sustain a stable reaction. Dr. Alistair Barkley and Lu Chen are about to release the results publicly. Mysterious men kill Barkley and blow up the experiment. Eddie finds the body and barely escapes the explosion. FBI Agent Leon Ford (Fred Ward) leads the investigation and the missing Lu Chen becomes the prime suspect. An incriminating fax arrives for physicist Lily Sinclair (Rachel Weisz) and $250k is found in Eddie's flat. Lily and Eddie go off to search for the person framing them. They escape to find help from Maggie McDermott (Joanna Cassidy). Lyman Earl Collier (Brian Cox) is leading another secret project with Paul Shannon.This could be an interesting thriller. However the movie keeps trying to be a Bond movie. Keanu Reeves makes outrageous escapes. There is an evil underground lair with a Bond villain with the appropriate henchmen. They are also pulling from The Fugitive although I wish the FBI is a little smarter than they're shown. Everything is push too far. Everything is too convenient. The conspiracy is too big. None of it is too believable but some parts of this is a fun ride. It is a little funny to see Ted from 'Bill & Ted' become a super agent.

Phil Hubbs I remember seeing the trailer for this film way back in 96 at the cinema. It looked really quite cool and exciting, Reeves was flying high at the time and it boasted some snazzy CGI, talk about deceptive!The whole film seemed to be centred around one sequence. That sequence being the huge explosion that occurs near the start and wipes out a vast area of Chicago, nuclear in appearance. Now this was back in the days when CGI was still a newish weapon and big flashy destructive sequences like this were looked upon as impressive and breaking the barrier.Looking back it is a nice effect but of course its dated and the cracks are showing, but I'm not gonna moan about that. The problem is the rest of the film is really quite dull, visuals are dull, action is dull and the acting is even dull despite a very good cast line up. Reeves is his usual monotone self, Weisz is a complete drip and Freeman now looks pretty clichéd in his natty Malcolm X looking 90's suit and hat. It really does feel like they wanted to show off their CGI destruction sequence so they made an entire film around that one moment. A completely by the numbers action thriller (if you can call it that) that covers every aspect you'd expect from the fugitive chase movie book. Bland boring so very very predictable and the films title is one of those totally meaningless but cool sounding types that looks even cooler with a striking font.4/10

koffeenkreame41-1 Simply put, one of my favorite movies of the 90s, because I'm a big fan of the Fugitive. This plot follows it adds a bit of a new age spin on it. Enjoyable flick with very good actors and a cast that features Keanu Reeves, Morgan Freeman, Fred Ward, Brian Cox, Rachel Weisz and many others, highly recommended if you're a fan of the Fugitive or U.S. Marshalls!The story is about a chemist & his friend suspected of murdering their mentor and Reeves & Weisz receive help from a friend of their fallen colleague and they try and find out who is trying to frame them for murder. Much like The Fugitive, which ironically is done by most of the same crew and features some of the actors from that film, it's a great flick to pass the time on.

James Hitchcock Eddie Kasalivich is a student machinist working on a project at the University of Chicago to obtain energy from water, when he discovers the secret of a process by which low-cost energy can be obtained from burning hydrogen, leaving only water as a residue. (The exact science is not always clear, but this appears to be some sort of nuclear fusion). Someone, however, obviously wants to sabotage Eddie's discovery, and one of his colleagues is murdered and the laboratory is destroyed in a massive explosion. Eddie and another colleague, Dr. Lily Sinclair, are questioned by the police and the FBI, and quickly realise that someone is trying to frame them for both the murder and the explosion. They are forced to go on the run to try and clear their names and to expose the true culprits.It is not just the science upon which the film is based that is unclear; the plot too is often over-elaborate and difficult to fathom. We eventually learn that the real villains are agents of the Government and of Big Business, who are desperate to suppress Eddie's discovery because they fear that a new cheap, environmentally friendly source of energy would make oil obsolete, force all oil companies into bankruptcy and lead to economic depression and social chaos. In fact, capitalism is rather more adaptable than the screenwriters imagine; a new energy source of this nature, by dramatically reducing industry's energy costs, would more likely lead to an economic boom and huge profits for those companies who could exploit this lucrative new technology. Existing energy companies would probably be among them, just as many stagecoach owners made a fortune from the invention of the steam train by re-investing their money in railway shares. The only people with a vested interest in preventing such inventions reaching the market would be the governments of those countries which possess vast reservoirs of crude oil and very little else, but the film-makers doubtless thought that, in paranoid conspiracy-thrillers like this one, the United States Government makes a better villain than do foreign ones.Keanu Reeves's performance as Eddie is adequate but not outstanding. Rachel Weisz as Lily, in her first starring role in a Hollywood film, is rather muted, and gives little indication that she would later develop into a major talent. Probably the best acting comes from the generally reliable Morgan Freeman as Paul Shannon, Eddie's old mentor who may have a sinister agenda, but "Chain Reaction" is not one of the really great Freeman films like "Glory", "Unforgiven" or "The Shawshank Redemption".The film does have some better qualities. The director Andrew Davis has been praised by his visual sense, and "Chain Reaction" is visually very attractive. The action takes place in winter and there is some striking photography of a wintry, snow-bound Chicago, especially the scenes set in the grim industrial districts and around the astronomical observatory which plays an important part in the plot. The action sequences are exciting, fast-moving and well handled.Davis has a reputation for specialising in thrillers. His films tend to vary in quality, but he has at least one very good one to his credit, "The Fugitive", one of the best thrillers of the nineties. (That film also dealt with a man forced to go on the run after being falsely accused of a crime). "Chain Reaction" is not in the same class as "The Fugitive", but it is a watchable thriller with some points of interest. 6/10