Customer Reviews
rubbish - By: martin thomas, 07 Jun 2008 
after rubbish film from brian de palma lets hope he has a return to form soon,this is bland, badly acted nonsense
Make notes, I'll be asking questions later. - By: Charles Vasey, 07 Mar 2008 
A complex who-dunnit with a good layer of Raymond Chandler hard-boiled dialogue laid on a specific era in America. You need to keep your wits about you to follow the plot which has more twists than a very twisty twisted thing. It isn't LA Confidential but it's not bad if you enjoy processing clues.
Disappointing - By: B. McDowell, 13 Jan 2008 Looking forward as I was to a repeat performance from the LA confidential school of cinema, I was astonished how bad this film was. Impenetrable dialogue, ludicrously convoluted & unbelievable plot, & a totallly wasted presence of the talented Scarlett Johansen. Like some of the other reviewers, I had this on my 'must see' list for the cinema but couldn't make it - glad I didn't.
Clumsy film based on a bad book - By: Doctor Goa -, 01 Jan 2008 
I read the boring book years ago & that was very slow to start with - alll that boxing & buddy bonding stuff that ate up far too much of the book and, in this case, the film, before getting to the nitty gritty, which in itself is treated at times more as a side issue. The film - like the book - lacks focus. There's the murder. There's a hunt for a secondary criminal. There's a cop's decline through drugs. There's a love affair. Police politics. Boxing. It's alll over the place, although the pieces do come together (perhaps more by luck than judgement). On the plus side, the post-2nd WW period is fairly effectively done, but still suffers from the odd amateur element (like the punch-up between sailors & others near the beginning, which looked far too contrived). Hmmm, I gave this three but thinking more about it.....
Black Marks For This - By: pablo, 02 Dec 2007 
The main trouble with this movie is that Brian De Palma thought he was making a screen noir type film. However,he seems to have forgotten this along the way & added in a bit more blood, sex & profanity than is normal for such films.Not that these additions add any more excitement as the end result is extremely dull & ends like a damp firework.
