Une affaire de détails

It's 1990 southern California. A young female motorist is harassed by a mysterious muscle car. L.A. Sheriff's Department homicide detective Jim Baxter (Rami Malek) investigates a murder. Kern County deputy sheriff Joe "Deke" Deacon (Denzel Washington) happens to be in town to retrieve evidence for another case. He's a former detective from LASD but left after some unspecified incident. He finds Jim's case to be connected to his former case. The two starts to suspect Albert Sparma (Jared Leto) who drives a muscle car to be a serial killer.

This is trying to be Se7en and True Detective and other high concept crime mystery with a twist. It's interesting in some aspects but falters in others. First and foremost, this is not a whodunnit. The movie piles on all the suspicion on Sparma with only a small wink at the fingerprint guy. Quite frankly, it's either Sparma or not Sparma. Anyone else would be meaningless anyways. There is some hope of turning this into a character study of these three people. That's a 50/50 proposition in this case. Denzel can sleepwalk through this role and I'm not saying that he is. I'm also not saying that he isn't. With Rami and Jared, the film has two of the most outlier actors around. It may be one too many. They are pushing very hard and at times, they push the movie over the edge. Finally, I have issues with the final confrontation. There are problems with it and I don't like it. Nevertheless, I still like the three actors and it's always interesting to see them go to work.

I enjoyed this movie. From the start I was enthralled by Denzel's character, he is a flawed man and he is dealing with the consequences of his choices. Rami Malek is masterful as a "by the book" cop working a seemingly endless string of predatory murders. They team up and are forced to make the most difficult decision a public servant has to make. This movie questions the essence of justice and the law.

Early in the movie he was heading to LA, and told his dog he would be back that night. Then he didn't and stayed in LA without any call home to care for the dog.

Sorry, I know that probably isn't a big deal to anyone but to some crazy pet owners, but it was a distraction.

Please click yes if you agree.

It's a slow burning film, great acting, Jared Leto looked really creepy, Focuses on the drama rather than the flash which I prefer. People always complain about the same old movie formula and when something comes along different they complain about that too! It is a decent film, no cliches, good to see Malek in a big film role and Washington is always great to watch.

Joe Deacon, A Deputy Sherriff in a regional police force, is sent to LA to fetch some evidence for a case. In LA he is reunited with many former colleagues as he was a homicide detective there. He is also drawn into a perplexing serial killer case, the details of which are very familiar.

Reasonably interesting, though had the potential to be brilliant. Started off well, with decent character development and an intriguing plot. Good casting and performances too. Denzel Washington puts in his usual solid performance, Rami Malek is good and Jered Leto does what he does best - act as a weird, off-the-wall character.

However, just when this looks set to be heading for something fantastic, cracks start to appear. The plot is less watertight and plausible and then it suddenly takes a rather tangential direction. This direction could have been a masterstroke if handled correctly but unfortunately it isn't. The ending is quite the damp squib. It is dressed up to appear quite profound but it isn't.

So quite disappointing in the end. If writer-director John Lee Hancock had stuck with the initial plot and made a tension-filled crime drama this could have been great. Instead he tries to take it in another direction and while this is more original, his plot is weak, making for an unsatisfying conclusion.