Reviewed by EWAN McDONALD
Herald rating: * * *
Bankrolled by Tom Cruise, this is a downbeat, hardbitten cop thriller that owes much to those classics of the genre, The French Connection and Serpico. The second outing for director Joe Carnahan, it impressed Harrison Ford so much that he hired the youngster
to shoot his next movie.
Jason Patric plays Nick Tellis, a decent undercover cop for the Detroit vice squad who's been suspended after the accidental shooting of a drug-dealing
suspect. Ray Liotta, bearded and overweight and ever more
reminiscent of a middle-period Robert De Niro, is Henry Oak, a brutal lieutenant who doesn't play by the rules.
Among the urban garbage, the pair are put together to track down the dealers who killed Liotta's partner, Michael Calvess (Alan Van Sprang), after his cover was blown. It's frenetic, often confusing, and not too many of the ends are tied up, with a lot of tricky camera work — more style abuse than
substance abuse. But if you like downbeat, hardbitten cop thrillers ...
DVD features: movie (105min); commentary by writer/director Joe Carnahan and editor John Gilroy; features, Making the Deal, Shooting Up, The Visual Trip, The Friedkin Connection.
