Secret Service Agent Frank Horrigan (Clint Eastwood) uncovers an assassination plot. A nutcase named Mitch Leary (John Malkovich) plans to kill the President; he taunts Horrigan for failing to save John F. Kennedy in 1963. Horrigan and Lilly Raines (Renee Russo) grow frustrated by bureaucratic pressure: the President's running for reelection and refuses to cancel events, and Leary always seems a step ahead. Naturally, Horrigan must go outside the box to foil Leary's plot.
In the Line of Fire has fun with Eastwood's persona. Still tough at 63, Eastwood nonetheless struggles to keep pace with the Presidential motorcade and endures ribbing about heart attacks. He mixes typical hard-boiled dialogue ("If I don't overreact, the president's dead!") with humanizing touches, wooing Lilly through piano solos and anecdotes about cussing out H.R. Haldeman. Horrigan's soulful monologues and guilt undercut Clint's mythic screen image, making him unusually vulnerable.
Jeff Maguire's script cribs freely from The Day of the Jackal (Leary's target shooting and disguises) and a million police procedurals (two phone trace scenes!). Predictably, Horrigan faces meddling bureaucrats (Gary Cole's smug Secret Service chief, Fred Dalton Thompson's sniveling Presidential aide) who cause bigger headaches than the assassin. Leary's a creepy, convincing lone assassin without the last act backstory, which seems a misguided play for sympathy.
Petersen's direction transcends the sometimes dodgy scripting. The film moves briskly enough, capturing Secret Service protocols with an interesting eye for detail: Horrigan's introduced busting counterfeiters and he muses on the pointlessness of running alongside an armored limousine. The reelection storyline provides a nice hook, building to a climax as Horrigan races to find Leary. Fire ends with an ingenious elevator standoff: held at gunpoint, Horrigan manages to talk past Leary to his colleagues.
John Malkovich complements Eastwood perfectly. His low-key, soft-spoken delivery makes him a unnerving psychopath, preternaturally clever and composed; he only unravels when Horrigan pushes his buttons near the end. The supporting cast is adequate: Renee Russo is strictly a love interest; Dylan McDermott, as Horrigan's partner, is an unhelpful; Gary Cole, Fred Dalton Thompson and Steve Railsback irritating pencil stains.
At times, In the Line of Fire seems a riposte to Oliver Stone's JFK, with Horrigan ridiculing barstool conspiracy theorists. It doesn't take a massive conspiracy to kill a President, merely a loser with a gun. Petersen and Eastwood celebrate the Secret Service for standing in their way, and doing it in style.
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