Liberty Stands Still 2002

Liberty Wallace [Linda Fiorentino] is the Vice President of Marketing for McCloud Industries, one of the United States’ largest gun manufacturers. She is the daughter of the company’s founder and married to its ruthless CEO, Victor Wallace [Oliver Platt]. While Victor traffics in international armaments, Liberty attempts a secret romance with Russell Williams [Martin Cummins], an actor who represents a calmer world outside the corporate power games.

Everything shifts when a sniper, Joe [Wesley Snipes], targets Liberty in a crowded Los Angeles park on the way to her extramarital rendezvous. Joe calls Liberty on her cell, ordering her to shack herself to a nearby hot dog cart. She refuses at first, but as gunfire erupts she obeys the demand, only to discover the cart is rigged with explosives. If she calls for help, hangs up, mutes the phone, or fails to cooperate, the bomb will detonate. Joe has also placed a second bomb against Russell, backstage in his dressing room at a nearby theater.

Liberty soon learns she cannot simply buy her way out of the ultimatum, and she is pushed toward Joe’s demand for an anti-gun forum. It is revealed that Joe’s daughter was fatally shot at school by a classmate who used a gun manufactured by McCloud. Joe has resolved to show Liberty—from the other end of the weapon—the horror she has helped enable for years.

Joe contends that Liberty will die, but she could die as a hero if she exposes her company’s shady business dealings and political ties before she is killed. He keeps Liberty under constant surveillance as she reveals secrets about her past and the company’s machinations.

Meanwhile, Victor—who is also having an affair—grapples with whether to protect himself or to rush to Liberty’s aid. At first it seems Joe, revealed as a former CIA agent, is using Liberty as bait to attract media attention. The plan intensifies when Joe shoots news reporter Bill Tollman [Jonathan Scarfe], the son of a hawkish U.S. Senator, hoping to spur the Senator to rethink his stance on gun rights.

A tense sequence unfolds as Joe/Alex calls Victor and taunts him from the scene. Victor recognizes the voice and recalls a past mission in Colombia in which Alex saved his life. He apologizes for a medal earned under questionable pretenses. Joe/Alex then shoots Victor before Liberty, revealing that the key to the shackles is hidden in a box beneath the hot dog cart. Liberty retrieves the key, frees herself, and hurries to Russell’s dressing room. The two watch the countdown together, only to discover the bomb’s timer has reached zero—not because it exploded, but because it was a fake.

As a police SWAT team closes in on Joe’s location, he shoots himself in the chin rather than be captured. Before dying, he ensures Liberty’s recorded confession reaches multiple newspapers, sealing the broader indictment of the arms industry and the political system that enabled it.