Sleepless - Il giustiziere

In Las Vegas, Vincent Downs (Jamie Foxx) and partner Sean Cass (T.I.) steal a shipment of cocaine. They turn out to be police detectives and Vincent volunteers to investigate the battle in the street. Jennifer Bryant (Michelle Monaghan) and Doug Dennison (David Harbour) from Internal Affairs are brought in on the case. Vincent is estranged from his son and his ex Dena Smith (Gabrielle Union) is newly engaged. He is surprised to find out that Stanley Rubino (Dermot Mulroney) and mob-related Rob Novak (Scoot McNairy) are the owners of the drug shipment. Then his son is kidnapped by them.

This is a crime action thriller in the vein of a Michael Mann movie. There are some good action with one particularly fun fight scene. The cast is good enough and it has the potential to be a solid crime thriller. The problem is that the movie never makes me care about Vincent and I never do. There are also some logic problems although logic may not be a big sticking point. This has all the parts but fails to put them together.

The two decades on either side of the new millennium seem to have been the heyday of movies about corrupt cops. After some pretty corny cop movies in the 1980s, 1990 started off its decade pretty well with "Q & A" and "Internal Affairs". As we moved through the 90s, Hollywood served up "Bad Lieutenant", "Unlawful Entry", "Léon: The Professional", "Cop Land" and the Best Picture Oscar nominee "L.A. Confidential". In the first decade of the 21st century, we got a chance to enjoy Denzel Washington's Oscar-winning performance in "Training Day", followed by the underrated pair "Cellular" and "16 Blocks" and, of course, the Best Picture Oscar winner "The Departed". The current decade has given us less popular dirty cop movies like "Rampart" and "The Place Beyond the Pines". 2017's "Sleepless" (R, 1:35) has things in common with the corrupt cop movies of the previous decade and those of the 90s.

The movie opens with Las Vegas police partners in crime prevention (and crime), Vincent Downs (Jamie Foxx) and Sean Cass (T.I.) stealing a bag of cocaine from a group of hooded thugs that they unceremoniously dispatch in the process. When their sergeant is assigning a team to investigate the homicide scene, Downs and Cass convince him to give them the case. Meanwhile, in the same department, Internal Affairs detective Jennifer Bryant (Michelle Monaghan) is recovering from a drug bust gone wrong. Bryant's partner, Doug Dennison (David Harbour) and the police psychologist express concern for Bryant's mental and physical state, but she insists on getting back to work. Bryant is also investigating the aforementioned drug murder because shell casings from police ammunition were found at the scene. As the story progresses, Bryant becomes convinced that Downs isn't what he seems.

Things get dicier when it is revealed that the cocaine that Downs and Cass stole belongs to casino owner Stanley Rubino (Dermot Mulroney). Rubino sends more masked thugs to kidnap Downs' son, Thomas (Octavius Johnson) and demands that Downs bring the drugs to his casino if he ever wants to see his son again. As Downs is trying to hide his son's predicament from the teen's mother, Dena (Gabrielle Union), the person for whom Rubino was transporting the drugs, ruthless local crime boss Robert Novak (Scott McNairy) comes looking for his coke. All this drama descending upon Rubino's casino is compounded when Bryant and Dennison, who have been following Downs, show up at the casino and work to figure out what's going on. This leads to a series of escalating confrontations and rising stakes for all involved.

"Sleepless" is entertaining, but forgettable and fails to live up to its potential. This is a remake of the 2011 French thriller "Sleepless Night", but can't match that film's adept storytelling and high tension. Several plot points in this American version are suspect at best, although the excellent cast helps draw you in and there are a couple decent twists late in the story. The plotting feels like a throwback to genre movies of the late 80s and early 90s and the overall quality is as unremarkable as the corrupt cop tales from earlier in the 2010s. "Sleepless" is good enough to keep you awake and somewhat engaged, but it isn't impactful enough to keep you up at night thinking about it. "B-"

Based on the coming attractions, I wasn't expecting much, and I got even less. This is another good cop/bad cop, is he or isn't he, kind of flick, set in Las Vegas with lots of glitz and glamour to hide what is a very shaky plot. If the glitz and glamour aren't enough to dazzle you, the music tracks will deafen you, and your visual delights will be satisfied with death by knife, death by pistol, death by automatic weapon, death by shotgun, death by truck, death by wine bottle - just to name a few.

The acting is pretty good, all things considered, but the direction is appalling and the action-every-minute film has low spots.

Generally I like films about internal affairs. "Internal Affairs" (1990), "The Departed" (2006) and "Q&A" (1990) are my favorites.

Here's the thing - if movies never suspended belief, they would be both pointless and incredibly dull. The reasons that the things we see in movies rarely happen in real life is because logic generally takes over and prevents these things from actually happening. Thus it would be incredibly difficult to make an entertaining movie without having quite a few illogical things happen. It just stands to reason. So when people come out of a movie and say they hated it because "x" would never happen or "y" didn't make sense or when a certain character did something they should have done something else, I don't really buy that as a reason to ever hate a movie. I have a feeling that is a lot of what is going on with 'Sleepless' and people's opinions of it. Admittedly throughout the film I kept thinking to myself those kinds of things, like this guy got stabbed a long time ago and has had about 10 fights since and still seems to have superhuman strength. You can notice these things, but I think you are being very tough if you are judging your entire opinion on them.

There's rarely a dull moment in 'Sleepless'. The action begins almost immediately and basically never lets up. I loved the fact that almost the entire movie takes place in one setting. It was like a fun house by the end with all the nooks and crannies being explored and visited by different characters. I also enjoyed the fact that you could never be entirely sure about whether or not a character was loyal or not. The characters were actually very well written almost entirely across the board.

As just a straight up entertainment package I really enjoyed 'Sleepless'. It never lost my interest once and it knew its limitations. If you ever find yourself bored watching this movie then I would suggest action movies are certainly not for you. If you can suspend your belief and just sit back and enjoy the ride, I think you will find you'll very much enjoy this film.

I think the other reviews forgot to mention the great cinematography, lighting in the scenes and suspensful sound/music, and for the most part good acting, that lifts this action packed thriller story from average and gives it a nice dark edge and some bite. Turn down the lights and turn up the sound and get ready for action.