The story is about the murder of an MP at the Presidio Army base in San Francisco. Because the killer left the base and tangled with SFPD cops, the case now is in both the jurisdiction of the police AND Army. But unfortunately, the cop assigned to the case (Mark Harmon) and the Colonel in charge of the military investigation (Sean Connery) hate each other and have a past. Can this odd couple manage to put aside their differences and solve the crime? And, can the Colonel's daughter manage to please BOTH of them?

Rarely have I disliked a trio of characters as much as I disliked the three leads in this film. I don't think it was the actors' faults, really...they just were delivering the lines as they were written. Sean Connery and Mark Harmon's characters were pretty one dimensional and they seemed to spend much of the movie doing lots of macho posturing...to the point where the film really lost me early on into the story. As for Meg Ryan who plays Connery's daughter...she also seemed about as unrealistic as the others and her car chase scene early in the story was cute...provided you didn't think at all about how ridiculous this was. Hopefully, the film gets better as NONE of these characters seemed like real people...more like caricatures.

So despite this, is the film worth seeing? Well, it's certainly NOT a film I'd rush to see and put it more in the category of a time-passer, at best. The reasons for not loving it are mentioned above, as the characters were bad and the film saddled with some occasionally horrid dialog.

By the way, some movies carry various warnings on the DVD cover. This one should have a warning about excessive macho posturing!

THE PRESIDIO is one in a surprising number of murder mysteries set at army bases; John Travolta and Jack Reacher have been involved in similar offerings. I mainly watched this due to being a big fan of Sean Connery and he doesn't disappoint, although the rest of the movie is strictly so-so. The hero of the hour is the wooden Mark Harmon, who comes across as sappy rather than likeable, and the film becomes extremely dull during his lengthy romantic sub-plot with Meg Ryan. The mystery and thriller aspects are better handled by old pro Peter Hyams, with two highlights in particular: the famous 'thumb' scene in the bar (Connery is a delight here) and a foot chase through San Francisco's Chinatown, which employs some wonderful camerawork.

When a military police officer is murdered on the Presidio of San Fransisco, a city detective and a provost marshal must form an uneasy alliance as they investigate the case.

This is a fair thriller with some exciting elements and is slickly made all round from the always watchable Hyams. It's one of his weakest films though, and I think I lay the blame for that mostly in Larry Ferguson's script. It lacks originality - all the elements of the characters and their relationships come from In The Heat Of The Night, Dirty Harry, Lethal Weapon and a hundred other cop movies. Also, and this bothers me about a lot of Hollywood movies, what is the point of the whole daughter romantic interest subplot ? Unless I'm mistaken, this is a film about diamond smugglers and a murder investigation. I don't really see (or care) what that has to do with Connery's inability to communicate with Ryan. I'm also not very taken with the cast here; Harmon is one-note, Ryan pouts and preens in her usual whiny and annoying manner, and the supporting cast aren't very interesting. Connery and Warden fare better, but both are hamstrung by the predictable story. When it's moving though, it's a pretty good flick - what it has going for it are pleasing Frisco locations, a couple of taut chase sequences, good photography and a moody score by Bruce Broughton. There's one scene I really like - Harmon charms some information out of a dispatcher purely by talking about The Grateful Dead; it's quirky, original and unexpected. The problem with this movie is that every scene in Capricorn One or 2010 is like that. A pleasant way to kill some time, but a rather lacklustre thriller. Trivia - Calfa and DiSanti sort of reprise their roles from The Star Chamber.