| Overall Grade: |
A |
|
| Story: |
A |
|
|
| Acting: |
A |
|
|
| Direction: |
A- |
|
|
| Visuals: |
A |
|
|
The Way a Detective Story Should Be
by Eric Ryder (movies profile)
Mar 3, 2008
Poor Easy Rawlins (Denzel Washington)! He's out of a job and he's behind on his mortgage payments. All that has changed when Rawlins meets a sleaze ball named DeWitt Albright (Tom Sizemore) who hires $100 to follow a Caucasian woman named Daphne Monet (Jennifer Beals), who's engaged to a rich politician named Todd Carter (Terry Kinney). Being that Rawlins is black and that Monet has a fondness for black men, Rawlins agrees to the job believing that it will be pretty simple for him to find. After collecting information from a friend, Rawlins gets into a mess he never thought would happen. Rawlins ends up getting framed for her murder. Now Rawlins is in an even more dangerous predicament than when he started as he must save himself from a potentially long jail sentence, crooked cops, powerful but ruthless politicians and intimidating hoodlums in segregated 1948 Los Angeles.At the same time, Rawlins would like to know why Monet is such an important commodity
What writer/director Carl Franklin succeeds in "Devil With a Blue Dress" that exceeds beyond most neo noir dramas is that he captures the feeling of the 1940's to life here and it pays homage to the neo noir dramas that were famous in that era. Even the simpler nuances like the jazzy soundtrack adds nostalgia giving it that special ingredient that carries the story by making it more richer and more easier to follow through. It's a traditional mystery genre as we see Rawlins lured into wider depths of the plot as more twists and tuns come into place. Although it flows by quite easy, it is by far a brainless murder mystery and some interaction from its audience is greatly required. The racism topic is not heavily touched in "Devil in a Blue Dress", but the topic of race is geared to an equilibrium matter towards the plot and the characters.
Overall, Washington adds charm and charisma in his performance. His reactions and his emotions are deadpan accurate and that alone Makes Easy Rawlins such a riveting character. It's hard to unravel if Easy Rawlins is an inspiration for future adaptations, but whatever the case, I would have liked to see more of Rawlins as a private investigator. Washington is backed up nicely by an ensemble group of terrific actors like Tom Sizemore, Terry Kinney, Lisa Nicole Carson, Jennifer Beals and Maury Chaykin. But the real show-stealer is from Don Cheadle as the trigger-happy Mouse Alexander. Over-the-top as he might be, Cheadle provides as much energy to a film that didn't really need it, though it was sure a pleasure to watch Cheadle perform. The performers were accurate by recreating the atmosphere of the 1940's.
Overall this movie was an enjoyable mystery to watch complete with plenty of twists and turns to go around. It goes beyond the 1940's in terms of settings, props and music. But it also stems from the place and time making it more compelling and the acting from Washington and company adding more to the icing on the cake. |
My Public Profile 
