One of the Finest Actors of Cinema History, James Woods delivers A Yet Another Fabulous Performance in 'The Boost'. A dark & depressing flick, that works mostly because of Woods.

'The Boost' Synopsis: A real-estate hustler & his wife see success, only to fall deep later-on.

'The Boost' is more about the side-effects of failure, rather than a story of drug-addicts. The struggle & the depression its pivotal characters go through, are very off-putting, as they depict reality.

Ben Stein & Darryl Ponicsan's Screenplay, though fairly engaging, gets a bit too serious & disturbing towards the second-hour. Harold Becker's Direction is proficient.

Woods is the biggest merit of 'The Boost'. He's so good as a suffering man, that my heart literally went out for him, even after he gives in to drug-addiction. Woods tops himself in here!

On the whole, 'The Boost' caters to a niche audience, but if Fine Acting is what you're looking for, then watching Woods's Masterful Performance in here, should top your list.

First you get James Woods so sit back and relax and enjoy as he does his job of entertaining you. Before I go on, read the book which is highly entertaining and so real and down to earth and you will be thoroughly entertained through and through with the combo. What we have here is stark reality of how drugs do what they do and what happens to humans while the drug does its thing. Anyone who has taken drugs or consumed too much food or alcohol can easily see the abuse of what they are doing take hold and redirect their true life as they do it. You see there is a Universal Law (rule) that states: Whatever you get into gets into you. This rule is non-negotiable. Here in this movie you see it up close and it has no mercy on whom it grabs on to. Mind you, everyone first believes the "lie" of this won't hurt, I won't get into it, I can get out of it, it is only temporary and many other variations. Then, at some point, the demon hook is set! Vividly constructed and acted out in both the book and the movie. Drugs and any excess are like lying, cheating and stealing. It works! It is getting caught or paying the price that no one likes. We are also introduced into another Universal Law: Every new high leads to a new low. Thus the low compels one to seek the high and a cycle of hell is born. Rational thought, reason and patience are the first to go followed by the darkness getting its turn and submitting its own dynamics some counterfeit, imitative and of course all substitute for the real life. Remember the famous: You can check in but you cannot check out statement? That's here too. Drugs? Addictions? Lies? Pray GOD it doesn't befall you and if it does, pray GOD to deliver you.

Modest little movie that went almost unnoticed when released in 1988, it took in just under 1 million dollars in total ticket sales. The movie "The Boost" is about as powerful in it's message about the destructive nature of drugs, legal and illegal, as the film "Days of Wine and Roses" was some 25 years earlier about the evils of alcoholism.

Down and out in New York City salesman Lenny Brown, James Woods, gets his big chance when real-estate tycoon Max Sherman, Steven Hill, takes notice of his innocent and boyish ability to charm people, that Max's associates didn't. Giving Lenny him a chance to show his stuff Max gives him a top job as a salesman for his firm back on the west coast. Lenny and his wife Linda, Sean Young, leave for L.A with a home and swimming pool a leased luxury Mercedes and high paying job there waiting for them. Lenny is easily up to the task in getting clients to buy Max's real-estate and within a year has worked himself up to become the most productive salesman in the real-estate business in L.A. It's then that things begin to go sour and Lenny just isn't up to the task of facing and dealing with them.

Making most of his sales due to tax shelters and right off the US Congress unexpectedly votes to close them putting the real-estate market into a tailspin as well as everyone, like Max & Lenny,behind the eight ball and in the red. Lenny for his part wasn't that economical with his money and not only spent it as fast as he earned it he also went hundred of thousands of dollars in debt expecting his future sales in real-estate to eventually pay them off. Broke out of a job and with no money to pay off his bills Lenny, as well as Linda, turn to the only thing that can make them forget their problems cocaine.

Gripping and disturbing film that doesn't have an happy ending with Lenny Brown blowing his whole life, and wife, away as he blows and gulps himself into oblivion on lines of coke and bottles of Quaaludes.

Top-notch performances by both James Woods and Sean Young as a young yuppie couple who get caught up with the wild and depressing times of the high flying and spending 1980's and crash from it's excesses in both money and personal, as well as private, entertainment. The movie ends with Lenny now totally hooked, and wiped out, on drugs talking to Ned, John Rothman,a NY Times reporter that he first met at the beginning of the film in New York City. Spilling his guts out in what looks more like an opium den then a one room apartment Lenny could only hope that Ned would write his story and have it published in the Times. His sad plight may very well help future Lenny's and Linda's from sharing the same fate.

P.S the film "The Boost" had actress Amanda Blake, who played Kitty on the 1950's & 60's TV Western "Gunsmoke", as Barbara in it as a washed up former showgirl and madam who, like Lenny, threw her life career and savings away by getting addicted to drugs. It turned out to be Amanda's last appearance as an actress on TV or in the movies as she died less then a year, on August 16, 1989, after the film was released.