A cop trying to clear the name of a woman he loves falls deep into a morass of corruption in this crime thriller. Ford Cole (Ray Liotta) is the district attorney in a crime-ridden town where he's contemplating a run for mayor in a bid for greater power. Cole is also having an affair with one of his assistants, Nora Timmer (Jolene Blalock), though he tries to keep that a secret. One evening, while Cole is chatting with journalist Trippin (Chiwetel Ejiofor), Timmer arrives with startling news --
she claims to have been sexually assaulted by Isaac Duparde (Mekhi Phifer), a clerk at a nearby music store who broke into her apartment. Making matters more complicated is the fact that Duparde is currently dead in her flat, leaving Cole to find a way to protect Timmer while not staining his own reputation. Cole realizes this may be harder than he imagined when Luther Pinks (LL Cool J) arrives on the scene to tell him that Timmer actually lured Duparde back to her apartment on purpose, in an effort to get information on a well-connected organized crime figure. Slow Burn was the first directorial effort from screenwriter Wayne Beach. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
Shelved for over a year, this incompetent mystery thriller stops periodically so some character or other can deliver an expository speech and pull the plot back on track, but by the end the story has turned into a hair ball.
A strange, sprained, but sprightly fusion of The Usual Suspects and the Tragic Mulatto, Slow Burn wants badly to turn its standard neo-noir into a nuanced racial chiaroscuro.
The bigger problem is that for all the plot turns and reversals and flashes of action that Beach has structured into his film, there's an elusive extra something that's missing.
Teeming with lurid atmosphere, Slow Burn touches on mutual stalking, inner city gangsta capitalism, and detonation of a ghetto as part of a lucrative urban removal gentrification scheme concocted by the city elite.
A pretty decent crime thriller with a strong cast. Not a lot of action but I thought it was a good story with some decent plot twists. In some elements it is like the usual suspects in the way the story unfolds with quite a few red herrings along the way. An enjoyable film that seemed to slip under the radar.
A sizzeling, sexy and blistering crime thriller. Bursting with riveting and nail-biting twist and turns that keep you on the edge of your seat. The suspense snaps and crackels like live wire. Intelligent and satisfying. Smart, stylish and very compelling. It gets better as it rips through the layers. An explosively
well-written and hard-hitting drama. Gripping and heart-pounding entertainment. A great and exceptional all-star cast. Ray Liotta rips through the screen with yet another memerising performance. He never fails to give an awsome portrayel. James Todd Smith is gives a great and confident performance.
No quotes approved yet for Slow Burn. Logged in users can submit quotes.
Submit a Quote from 'Slow Burn'
A quote can be a single line from one character or a memorable dialog between several characters. Please make your quotes accurate. Quotes will be submitted for approval by the RT staff.
Example:
Luke: Alright. I'll give it a try. Yoda: No. Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.
Top Critic
