Turk and Rooster, two aging NYPD detectives who have been longtime partners are faced with a serial killer who is murdering sociopathic criminals. They both have personal issues, and when they start working with a younger team, Perez and Riley, tensions between the pairs of partners is inevitable, especially since Turk is now living with Perez's ex-girlfriend, also a homicide detective.
Description of Righteous Kill:
Righteous Kill pairs two cinematic icons whose previous screen collaboration, Michael Mann's 1995 Heat, was absolutely electrifying despite minimal time together in a long movie. Now in their mid-60s, De Niro and Pacino are playing veteran cops who, despite being grizzled, should look much younger than these actors. The incongruent casting makes the dark story improbable from the get-go, and things get worse as dialogue by screenwriter Russell Gurwitz quickly sounds like a parody of vintage cop movie cliches. It's a strain to find anything that works. The two leads play longtime detectives and partners whose weariness with rapists, murderers, pedophiles and other villains appears linked to the acts of a serial killer taking out bad guys who got away with heinous crimes. A videotape confession by De Niro's tightly-coiled Turk--who has been seeking the killer with Pacino's Rooster--would seem to establish his ties to the events. But the movie isn't over until it's over, assuming one is still with the movie after plodding along with its facsimile of noir conviction. Director Jon Avnet never gets a handle on Righteous Kill's gritty heart, superficially pushing suspense along with heavy-handed editing, and adding unpersuasive sauce in the form of Turk's somewhat S&M sexual relationship with a female cop (Carla Gugino). Giving the proceedings sort of a boost are Donnie Wahlberg and John Leguizamo as a younger pair of sleuths working the same case. This could easily have been a better movie with those two in the leads. --Tom Keogh
Stills from Righteous Kill (Click for larger image)
Righteous Kill Reviews: You Numb Nuts have to be joking!! 2009-10-26 - De Niro & Pacino were the movie they were awesome.
You people take movies way to serious, instead of trying
to enjoy them.
Non-stop action, suspence and had you goin one way and at the end
you find out you had it all backwards.
I give the movie a 5 of 5 stars.
If your a true fan of De Niro & Pacino you'll like it!!
Righteous Kill is worth watching! 2009-10-12 - Two of my favorite actors side by side is exciting enough. I hever had a clue about the ending. I really enjoyed watching them act together and enjoyed the movie till the end. The ending is surprising and having them both together was worth the time and money to watch it. It appears that they acted their parts, they acted well but just watching these two veteran actors on the screen made it worth watching. They don't even have to try, to be my favorites.
De Niro and Pacino, great combination! 2009-09-30 - A very solid drama movie! Wow! De Niro and Pacino are great in this movie! The story is about a cop who is a serial killer of those who "escape" traditional justice. Great characters and alot of suspense. Well worth the time to watch it.
"The badge is nice . . . as long as it comes with a gun." 2009-09-14 - Before I saw this thriller, I kept hearing many mixed reviews about it. From James Berardinelli to Spill Reviews, most found it very average. I finally got a chance to watch this Righteous Kill, but with very moderate expectations. After the film was over, I found myself liking it. Not loving it, but liking it. It wasn't great, but it wasn't terrible, either. It was . . . between average and above average.
I think I'll start with the bad. I'm not a fan of Curtis Jackson (50 Cent), so I knew right away that his acting was wooden and dull. He doesn't even say most of his lines right; it sounds a bit like gibberish to me. Now, if Christopher Bridges (LUDA!) played Jackson's part, then it would have been far more engaging. Also, throughout the film, there are numerous cliches that we've all seen before (good cop bad cop, for example). If there was even a hint of originality, I would have given it a higher rating. The third flaw we have here is the plot twist. We already know that Turk (played by De Niro) is not the killer, so the major twist at the end wasn't shocking enough. Then, we have the script, which isn't really Grade A material. Some of the dialogue was pretty cheesy, and some scenes felt very uneven. And lastly, the sex scenes . . . they were very out-of-place and very unnecessary.
Now, here's the good. First we have De Niro and Pacino. I mean, DE NIRO & PACINO! In the classic film Heat, they were only onscreen together for about ten minutes. Here, these two guys share the screen almost throughout the movie. And although, as I mentioned before, the script is pretty average, De Niro and Pacino deliver their lines very well. The supporting cast (Dennehy, Wahlberg, Gugino, and Leguizamo) do a very fine job as well. Finally, there are a bit of references to Heat that can be found here, and while they are a bit too obvious, they're mildly decent at best.
Again, this is a thriller that's not great and not horrible. I give it a B- because, even though there were some crappy moments, it's still fun to watch Pacino and De Niro interact with each other. Jon Avnet is a good director, but he could have given a lot of things here some improvement. I hope he gets to make far more sophisticated films in the future.
america's critic 2009-09-11 - by far this movie was entertain it was just how the trailer put it out to be--- from the looks of other reviews they must of wanted it to be action packed, this movie fooled me it was great it is deffenitly worth watching.
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