Ein Cop mit dunkler Vergangenheit

I was reading some reviews on this movie and pretty much ignored them because of all the star power. In the end the critics were right about this movie. Every actor in this movie looked out of place and not interested in the part they were playing.

Let's start with the younger kids in the flash backs. Overall, the acting was very poor from the younger generation in this film, Channing Tatum younger barely spoke and when he did it didn't seem real. Maybe, I was thrown off here because Tracy Morgan and Channings younger didn't even come close to resembling the adults.

I don't think anyone read the script before accepting the gig. Throwing a lot of great actors together for a crime thriller sometimes doesn't work and this is one case where it failed. Poor story, poor direction, and just downright bad acting by a lot of the big names in this film starting with Channing Tatum. If someone could turn back the clock this movie would of never made it past the green light.

THE SON OF NO ONE implodes under its own weight. It is another variation of the tired good cop/bad cop theme and the sins of childhood theme. Despite the presence of a heady cast of high profile actors this story just never takes off. Perhaps that is partially due to the fact that the lead actor role is given to Channing Tatum who though he does show some gradual improvement in learning his acting skills remains a one dimensional character on the screen.

To keep it short, the plot can be condensed as follows: rookie cop Jonathan 'Milk' White (Channing Tatum) is assigned to the 118 Precinct in the same district where he grew up. The Precinct Captain (Ray Liotta) starts receiving anonymous letters about two unsolved murders that happened many years ago in the housing projects when Jonathan was just a kid. A reporter (Juliette Binouce) sees the letters as evidence for an inside cover-up of the two murders from Jonathan's childhood and a detective (Al Pacino) leads the 'investigation' with the corroborated intent of cover-up of police action. There are scenes of flashback to when the murders occurred and the perpetrator is indeed Jonathan as a kid (Jake Cherry) whose only friend is young Vinnie (Brian Gilbert) - the victims were abusive junkies but Jonathan has never been able to forget the gruesome facts. We jump back and forth in time: Jonathan is happily married to Kerry (Katie Holmes) and they have a loving daughter with petit mal seizure disorder. As the investigation proceeds Jonathan fears for his family's safety and for the safety of his old friend Vinnie (now Tracy Morgan). The ending is predictable and far too prolonged.

Despite the presence of Binoche, Pacino, Liotta and Holmes (and a group of very talented youngsters who play the leads as children) the story is just too drawn out and predictable and filled with violence to make it work. Dito Montiel wrote and directed.

Grady Harp

A young cop (Channing Tatum) is assigned to a precinct in the working class neighborhood where he grew up, and an old secret threatens to destroy his life and his family.

The basic story here is pretty good, and with Al Pacino and Ray Liotta on board, it should be hard to fail. But this film just comes up short. It has a few too many flashbacks, too many clichés about corrupt cops. And it makes a much bigger deal out of a situation than need be. It conflates the word "murder".

Maybe a fine-tuning of the script would have made this film a winner. And probably casting anyone else in the world besides Katie Holmes would have helped.

'THE SON OF NO ONE': Two and a Half Stars (Out of Five)

I was severely let down by 'THE SON OF NO ONE'! I'm a fan of the filmmaker Dito Montiel, who wrote and directed the film, and I like most of the cast. Montiel also helmed two other urban dramas 2006's 'A GUIDE TO RECOGNIZING YOUR SAINTS' (which was pretty good) and 2009's 'FIGHTING' (which I absolutely loved). Those films both starred Channing Tatum, like this one does, so Tatum appears to be Montiel's go to guy. 'SAINTS' also starred Shia LaBeouf and Robert Downey Jr. though (who made the movie) and 'FIGHTING' also starred Terrence Howard (who turned in my favorite performance of that year!). This one co-stars Al Pacino, Ray Liotta, Katie Holmes, Juliette Binoche and Tracy Morgan. With all that talent and what Montiel has already delivered us I expected a lot more from this film. Instead we get a routine cop movie with weak pacing and an unsatisfactory ending. The cast is still good but there was potential for so much more!

Tatum plays Jonathan White, a young police officer with a wife, Kerry (Holmes) and sick daughter, Charlie (Ursula Parker). Early on in the film he's assigned to a precinct in Queens where he grew up. He and his fellow officers also start receiving mysterious letters from an anonymous writer bringing up a cold case from 1986 which accuses a police officer of covering two murders up. Jonathan is troubled by these letters as they remind him of haunting memories from his past and may jeopardize his future. He tries to figure out who's sending the letters as we see the horrors he and another childhood friend experienced at the time through flashbacks.

The movie is nicely stylized and appears to be moving, suspenseful and mysterious but it never quite makes any sense. Like I said the acting is all decent, especially the young boy who plays Jonathan as a kid (Jake Cherry). I like Tatum, I don't think he's a great actor but he can be likable in the right role. Here he's decent, well cast and does the best he can but has nothing really to work with. Pacino and the others are all as good as they can possibly be as well. The blame lies solely with Montiel for the movie's failures, mainly just his weak script. A few more rewrites really could have worked wonders for this movie and next time these talented actors shouldn't sign on so quickly. Hopefully Montiel will learn from his mistakes and be back to what he does best with his next film.

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Written and directed by Dito Montiel and based on a novel of the same name, "The Son of No One" is a mystery thriller that should have never been made into a movie.

Set in 2002, Queens, the son of a former NYPD detective, Jonathan White (Channing Tatum) is a hardworking rookie cop, providing for his wife and daughter, when new evidence on a 1986 double homicide grabs the attention of Captain Marion Mathers (Ray Liotta). Complications arise when Jonathan is confronted by his father's former partner, Detective Stanford (Al Pacino), where evidence from a mysterious source trails back to Jonathan as a troubled child. Even as he struggles to come to terms with his past, Jonathan learns that there are forces working at shutting this cold case once and for all.

Evidently, writer/director Montiel tries to fit a lot of fine print into the screenplay. The problem, as I see it, is that this becomes all too obvious very early in the movie; Owing to which, the so called 'twist ending' results in a very half-baked offering that totally ruins any saving grace from the likes of Pacino and Liotta. Demons in the closet, or ghosts of the past, or whatever you call it, form the very gist of the story, where Montiel tries to prove that sometimes it is best not to dig up the past. That being the case, Montiel then goes on to contradict himself by also throwing in themes of redemption and absolution. This clash in philosophy fractures the film's main plot beyond repair and by the time the twist is revealed, it is way too late to salvage anything. Making a police drama within the crime genre is always interesting when the plot is about dirty cops, police cover-ups, and as we have seen many times before, a cop on the edge. To an extent, Montiel gets it right by including all this into the plot, yet somehow, his main failure is in bridging all this together.

For this reviewer, a film's story forms the bulk of its appeal. It's like a deck of cards really; if the foundation is shaky, the entire structure crumbles under its own weight. This is exactly what happens here. Ironically, Montiel directs the very movie he has written, so no points for guessing who gets the credit for this colossal failure. Pacing is another weak component as the entire film is a slow-burner. I have to agree that some films need slow pacing to build strong characterization, but again, it backfires with a lot of flashbacks on Jonathan, with hardly enough focus on Stanford and Mathers, who just happens to be vital characters in the plot. By the end, Stanford and Mathers are absurd and vague in their cause to maintain the integrity of the policing profession.

I have always commended Liotta for his antagonistic roles, especially after his memorable psychotic cop in "Unlawful Entry". Recently, Pacino has also played deranged cops in "88 Minutes" and "Righteous Kill". Together, Pacino and Liotta are decent at best for argument sake, however, as veteran actors, their screen time and limp characterization do not justify their star power. Waste of talent, if you asked me. On the other hand, Tatum has a meatier role here compared to his more recent films and appears to have done a decent job in the lead, considering the lackluster story. Even so, the film is just too bland and pointless to consider any effort by Tatum, Pacino and Liotta or even supporting roles from Tracy Morgan and Katie Holmes.

Avoid it like a plague.