Movie review: Righteous Kill

By Miller Davis

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Righteous Kill is one of those films that leaves you wondering “Why did this ever get made into a movie?”

The movie stars Al Pacino as Rooster and Robert De Niro as Turk, who play hardened New York City cops who are investigating a series of killings. It is a very predicable venture, one in which loyalties are questioned, friendships are tested, and no one really knows what’s really going on. The movie attempts to twist and turn from the beginning but only manages to create wildly underdeveloped characters, a slew of bad tough-guy lines and possibly the worst plot hinge I’ve ever seen in film.

The “twist” ending is visible within the first half hour. Watching these two great actors unable to get any authenticity from such a sub-par script is agonizing. The supporting cast is solid with John Leguizamo, Donnie Wahlberg and Brian Dennehy. But even they can’t inject life into this hollow corpse of a movie. 50 Cent plays an inner-city drug dealer and sadly is the most authentic of all the actors. The moment I knew this movie was going to be terrible is when we met Rob Dyrdek of Rob & Big fame as the skateboarding pimp, Rambo.

Both Pacino and De Niro need to review their acting choices more thoroughly and not just jump at any movie that gives them a glimpse of their former hard-ass personas that we all know and love. I liked this movie better the first time it was made, when it was called Heat.

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