John Larkin (Timothy Hutton would seem to have the ideal life: A great job, a beautiful home, a happy marriage. Nonetheless, John has always been nagged by the feeling that "something is missing." The truth of this suspicion is violently driven home when John is inexplicably kidnapped from his home in the middle of the night by two sinister strangers. Managing to escape, John makes his way back to his wife (Suzy Amis--only to find out that she's not his wife at all, but instead a doctor for a top-secret government agency. Laboriously putting the pieces together, John realizes that he has never truly existed as a human being since he was nearly killed in a car crash: Instead, he is a semi-android, his brain implanted with false and misleading memories--all part of a master scheme to transform him into a "perfect" government assassin! Not dissimilar to such theatrical technothrillers as Total Recall, the made-for-TV Dead by Midnight (you'll have to see the film to understand the title's grim significance) was first aired by ABC on November 23, 1997. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Editorial Review of DVD
When a series of disturbing dreams lead a suburban husband and father to doubt the reality of his middle-class existence, he finds that his suspicions are well founded in this mind bending sci fi thriller from director Jim McBride. John Larkin (Timothy Hutton) has been having some pretty bizarre dreams lately, and when the strange visions from his sleep begin drifting into the daylight he begins to suspect that everything is not as it seems. After being abducted from his home and escaping his captors, John discovers that his entire memory has been programmed as a result of a top-secret government operation. Now, with the government on his trail and time running out, John must find out the truth about his past before his memory is erased forever. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
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