Slow Burn

Plot synopsis:
Ford Cole (Ray Liotta) is a big-city district attorney with his eye on the mayor's office and a big problem on his hands. His assistant district attorney, Nora Timmer (Jolene Blalock), confessed to killing a man in what she claims was self-defense. Things get worse when a stranger named Luther Pinks (LL Cool J) comes to the police station and contradicts her story. With his career and maybe his life on the line, Ford has a few hours until 5am August 17 to sort the truth from the lies. Danny (Taye Diggs) is a gang leader that has built an empire across eleven cities and is buying up all the land in a bad part of town that would be worth a fortune if the buildings were torn down and the area was rebuilt. Ford thinks he can cinch the election if he can catch
Danny. The problem is he has no idea what Danny looks like. He gets a break when he finds out Nora dropped charges against Jeffery Sykes (Taye Diggs), a known Danny associate, and Ford uses him to ID Danny. Sykes IDs Pinks
as Danny. Ford figures out Nora has set him up and she is working for Danny.
Ford also figures out that there will be a gas explosion that will level the neighborhood at 5am. Ford gets there in time but does not stop the explosion.
So with Danny now owning the neighborhood, Ford decides to force a
confrontation with Nora and Pinks who Sykes ID'ed as Danny. Ford tells
Nora he has Danny and drags her to the interrogation room where Pinks is.
In the hallway, Nora sees Sykes and calls him Danny and tells him she
didn't give the police anything to hold against him. Sykes, IDed as Danny,
shoots a cop and runs. Ford kills Sykes thinking it's Danny. Ford confronts Pinks who confesses he is undercover FBI. Pinks leaves with a reporter that was doing a story on Ford (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and as Pinks and the reporter congratulate themselves
on outsmarting everyone, they are being taped by the FBI. The reporter, the real Danny, is arrested leaving all of the neighborhood ownership to a Cayman Island corporation controlled by Jackie Longbough aka Nora Timmer. Jackie
insured that Ford, the Mayor, police chief and governor all had ownership in the corporation. This would all be revealed if there were a court case. Closing scene shows Jackie in the Cayman Islands.

Tags: murder, flashback

Review:
I rented this on New Year's Eve to counter the boredom of Bowl games, and found the movie to be surprisingly good.
There was a compelling and believable storyline (think of "Body Heat" set in a contemporary northeastern city instead of lazy Miami), it was well acted and a real thriller.
I especially liked LL Cool J's performance, and Liotta was believable as the White urban politico.
I also liked that the movie didn't shy away from comments (however simplistic) about race.
I remember growing up on films such as The Firm, The Pelican Brief, The Client, The Fugitive, films with enough plot twists and turns to keep things fresh and interesting.
I was more than pleasantly surprised to see excellent performances from an otherwise pieced-together cast of Ray Liotta, Taye Diggs, LL Cool J, Mekhi Phifer, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and of course Jolene Blalock.
I enjoyed every minute of this film whose score and choice of background, and especially credit, music made it all that much more memorable.Personally, I love films in, around, or about the city.
Without giving anything away, Slow Burn deals with corruption and a little gang-related mystery; all the while providing that sense of empathy for Liotta's character that seems all too absent in modern films today.No, this film is not for everyone, but if you can remember what it was like to be genuinely stringed along and interested in what happens at every twist and turn of those 90's film plots, then you should find yourself feeling that you got you're 9.50's worth on a Friday night..
This wore out its welcome about 40 minutes into the movie and after the halfway point, about 10 minutes later, I totally didn't care if our girl here was innocent or guilty.
In fact, it was stupid because it committed the ultimate sin for making a movie - it bored the hell out of its audience, and an audience that includes some "smart people" who can figure things out.
A convoluted movie is just that, and not fun to watch no matter what any viewer's IQ might be.Movies that revolve around the big question "Did he/she kill the person or not" are either extremely interesting and involving or the opposite.
I found it un-involving, and when you don't care about the characters, then you don't care who's innocent or guilty and the film loses all effectiveness.This movie was filmed in 2003 but not released until this year - four years later!
Ray Liotta plays a district attourney running for mayor when his DA is raped by a supposed psychotic music store clerk and then murders him.
I haven't heard of Jolene Blalock but she is excellent in her role as the supposedly raped(was she or wasn't she?) DA who may have some tricks up her sleeve.
I rented this movie because of the actors involved - Ray Liotta, LL Cool J, Taye Diggs, Mekhi Phifer and the great Bruce McGill.
The movie touches on some interesting subjects and has some potential - but the end result is, well, quite a mess.
Slow Burn seems to be quite inspired by "The Usual Suspects" - which is by no means a bad thing.
I lost track of the tricks the movie tried to pull to surprise the audience toward the end.
Slow Burn has a lot of twist and turns the movie is to be taken just as the title "Slow Burn".
Girls you have some of the top good looking men in the movie that's a plus.
In the opening scene of "Slow Burn," an assistant district attorney (Jolene Blalock) is found wandering the streets of the city, disheveled and confused, informing those who find her that she has just killed a rapist in self defense.
(Ray Liotta) and the assistant D.A. have been conducting a torrid affair of their own for a number of years now."Slow Burn" fails on so many levels of rudimentary storytelling and film-making that it's hard to know where exactly to begin in compiling a list of its shortcomings.
Eventually, the twist-and-turn plotting leads to so much incoherence and confusion that you might well wonder if the filmmakers themselves understood what it was they were doing.Beyond the clumsy, inscrutable storytelling, "Slow Burn" also suffers from some of the most overripe dialogue this side of "The Black Dahlia." With such knee-slapping howlers as "She stood there like a tangerine, ripe and ready to be peeled" and "She walked in smelling like mashed potatoes and every guy within thirty feet wanted to be the gravy," the script could easily win First Prize in a Bad Film Noir Writing contest.
It's hard to believe at such times that the film isn't actually intended to be a parody (the acting sure suggests it on occasion).
Ray Liotta as a DA running for Mayor who has trouble when one of his best and brightest assistants turns herself in for shooting someone in self defense.
Complicating matters is a drug lord who shows up to tell Liotta things are not as they seem.Bad make up job on our leading actress aside this is a good but not great little thriller that would have fared better as "made for cable original" where the expectations wouldn't be that high.
Give it points for twisting and turning, take one or so back for being only a step or two above most direct to video releases.Worth a look but late on a Saturday night where this would be perfect fare before bed time..
I agree this movie had some great actors (Ray Liotta), and a decent plot.
This movie tried to tell us that the Danny Ludden character owned property all over "the city", which they slipped and called Detriot once, and controlled a gang that ran Detroit, and no one had ever seen him.
Meanwhile the Assistant DA who Ray Liotta is banging is intertwined within the movie as a rape suspect/murder suspect who is thought to be black, but is really white.
Is the viewer to believe that in this day in age in the US there can be an Assistant DA in a city like Detroit who is using a false identity and no one catches this?
Oh well, don't waste your time, watch the Usual Suspects for a decent movie with a good plot..
SLOW BURN is a film that has much to like, much promise, and a cast of trusty actors to bring it off.
It is like watching a 'follow-the-bouncing-ball' film: there are many surprises and subplots and altered identities that keeping a score card of where the story is going is a bit difficult.Reduced to the bare bones the plot takes place in a 24 hour period during which District Attorney Ford Cole (Ray Liotta) and his Assistant DA Nora (Jolene Blalock) are in a showdown with a significant crime boss Luther Pinks (LL Cool J).
Nothing is as it seems, as irritating flashbacks attempt to prove, and in the end the good guys and the bad guys are difficult to appreciate.
There are some excellent performances by reliable actors such as Taye Diggs, Mekhi Phifer, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Bruce McGill, but the plot depends on a significant point of the confused racial identity of Jolene Blalock's character, and though she acts well, the part would have been better served by an actress like Nicole Ari Parker, to name just one.The problem with this supposedly enigmatic thriller is that the astute viewer will see through the plot far too early.
But given the quibbles, it is good to see these actors at work, especially the underused Ray Liotta.
Characters are chameleon-like and plot is transparent and convoluted at the same time, reminding a bit John Grisham's novels adaptations.
The twists capsizing everything over the last twenty minutes turn the conclusion into a big mess but heat is not lacking at all.
Plot reversals and action flashes look like a fusion of "The Usual Suspects" and Hollywoood legal thrillers, besides this political/Court story also handles themes of racial confusion and conflicts.
Not a stellar cast, but the movie is overall well acted (Ray Liotta has a pulse as usual)..
if it would not be for sign of "low budget" in some scenes, and a certain "too close" resemblance of "the usual suspects", this feature would be an excellent thriller in itself.
one of the best roles for Ray Liotta, LL Cool J, Mekhi Phifer and Jolene Blalock, played accordingly as well.there are 2 main problems that create a certain let-down for this production.
second one is the one scene that contains an explosion and where the cgi effects are VERY bad( while that is not important to the plot at all, somehow will affect your impression and visual perceptions since the suspense about around there is great- kind of a "let down" for a few moments).
also i might add that at times the plot seems rushed-off, but maybe because is trying to pull the exact same dialogs-camera work-twists as in "the usual suspects"( one of the best suspense movie EVER!).all the action happens in one night.
Ray Liotta plays in Chazz Palminteri with the exception that here, this particular character is more extensively developed ; he is the central one after all.
i will not say who the other "guys " are but there are enough twists that will keep you guessing until the end 5 minutes or less.
just like "usual suspects" makes perfect logical sense( i really respect that first and fore-most in any respectable thriller).
a good positive point as well would be that the movie never slows down as the "b" features generally do, by having "fill-up" scenes in its middle parts.enough said, i am going in circles on this title since it is a rip-off( there, i said the word again, hehe) and the original score keeps pupping up in my head, the resemblance is just way to great; overwhelming actually even if completely different in details( only Nora Timmer character, the woman, is more developed here in comparison).
it is a good watch nevertheless, and will not disappoint you if you can "pass" the explosion scene without loosing any interest...
so the plot gets 10 stars( while i will ignore the similarities, they are different in context itself and do make perfect sense overall ), the acting gets 10 as well( i can not think of anyone that was playing "badly"), the soundtrack gets an 8 ( great musical choices but not consistent, again a sign of low budget),the camera work gets a 10( great achievement for a low budget), the script gets a 5( 1 for originality in essence and 10 for consistency), and finally the cgi effects get a more then deserved 1 star.
For dolts, any movie with a twist and characters "aren't who they seem to be"...bingo (!), it just like "The Usual Suspects"."The Usual Suspects" is a better movie, but "Slow Burn" is a lot of fun.
If a black woman was cast, it would have been a different movie.
Lots of twists, great performances and once again -Ray Liotta does an impeccable job.A story worth watching and something that isn't truly a happy ending - like so many tv shows are.This is good design on so many levels..
This was quite honestly one of the best movies I've seen in a long time.
So I figured it would be middle of the day, watch it just to pass time type movie...
I turned my laptop off 2 minutes into the movie.
There was plot turns from beginning to end, good acting, pretty lady constantly naked.
Almost turned off this soft porn movie, but glad a stayed for a twisted ending.
So in the end, I'm glad I stayed with it.In a movie this complicated, I am sure there are some loose ends, but I thought they did a good job of tying things together in the end.I was OK with the flashbacks and plot twists, but I am probably not your average viewer.
If you don't like to stay with a film, it may not be the film for you.They do keep you guessing to the end..
I thought this was a great movie.
It reminded me of the Kevin Spacey's movie "The Usual Suspects".
Yet I haven't seen a web site that recommends it if you watched this movie.
And I felt this movie had a Prestige ending.
I was still putting the pieces together hours after the movie had ended.
I was nearly going to skip this movie, because it was a 2005 film.
But after that the movie picks up and the twists keep on coming.
Even though I have said that this movie is like "The Usual Suspects" it is different and takes it to a higher level..
She was, as LL's character hinted when he said that even the FBI had been penetrated, the dirty FBI agent.She was pretending to be black, as she new this would get Danny's attention and make him believe she could be manipulated.
She made Danny feel comfortable enough to give her information about rival gangs which she used to propel herself into the DA's office putting her in a perfect spot to manipulate Ray Liotta's character.LL Cool J was an FBI agent, although he was not dirty.
Rupert was the one who rigged the gas explosion.After Danny got arrested, everything went on to her.The key is to remember that the main plot had little to do with Jolene's character being raped, and it had little to do with LL's character..
SLOW BURN (2007) * Ray Liotta, LL Cool J, Mekhi Phifer, Jolene Blalock, Guy Torry, Taye Diggs, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Bruce McGill.More like a simmering potboiler:1995's crackling neo-noir sleeper "The Usual Suspects" was in a class by itself but lately there have been some numerous copycats in attempting to glean some magic from its infamous twisted ending revealing who its arch-criminal Keyser Soze really was.
The latest pretender to the throne is a horse of another color (and yes the pun is meant to be offensive).Set in the twilight hours in a no-names urbane city an ambitious DA named Ford Cole (Liotta, who is also a producer on this dreadful film) who is summoned to the police station when one of his younger protégées (and current lover), Nora Timmer (mannequin Blalock) has been involved in a lethal shooting after her claims of being raped by her assailant, Isaac Duperde.Adding fuel to the fire is many turns in this serpentine crime drama that offers about as much suspense as a re-run of any form of "Law & Order": Timmer may or may not have been having an affair with the deceased assailant, may or may not know the true identity of the mysterious local kingpin and may or may not be involved in a convoluted scheme involving high-level real estate conspiracies with the aforementioned gangsta.Enter Luther Pinks (Cool J), who has some info on Timmer confirming she is not on the level and his identity is also in question (as is his purple prose involving his olfactory senses with laughable line readings).The whole lousy mess is indecipherable until it's cribbing of the final act of "Suspects" for its own conclusion that not only cheats a smart, knowing audience but feels like a cheat from the minute one character is onto another with a fateful 'wait=a-second' glance and pause in his tracks.Although Blalock is a real hottie, the shameful way her character is depicted as either a 'sista pretending to be white' or vice versea as some sort of living-in-the-shadows- chameleon is only further drummed over the head by the ham-fisted direction by Wayne Beach in his debut as a helmsman and also the film's scribe.
The fact he actually shows a real-life chameleon during several sequences involving Nora is truly eye rolling.It doesn't help that the film has been on the shelf for several year.
It's the exact problem I had with "Usual Suspects".The supposed hero here is Ray Liotta's character.
He does alright with the role, but the character is not especially interesting and doesn't have much on the line.
The final twist has us believe an FBI agent allows 3 innocent people to be killed (2 of them police @ the precinct house), to keep his cover, THEN exposes the "Suspect".
Still, film very good.
Writer/director Wayne Beach is so caught up in his own supposed cleverness that he forgets some basic elements of storytelling, resulting in a film that will bore the pants off you.Ford Cole (Ray Liotta) is the District Attorney for Los Angeles who also happens to be running for mayor.
Cole believes Norah, at least partly because the two of them are secretly lovers, until a man calling himself Luther Pinks (LL Cool J) walks into the police department with a completely different story.
The whole thing revolves around something that's going to happen at 5 AM and, believe it or not, the confusion over whether Norah is a white woman pretending to be black or a black woman who can pass for white.
The whole thing wraps up in the extremely rare quintuple twist which is so empty, superficial and stupid that it demonstrates why only morons think they can slap 5 plot twists on the end of their film.Slow Burn starts out violating the first rule of filmmaking and just goes on from there.
The main character in all the flashbacks is Isaac, but we're never shown or even told anything about what kind of man he's is or why we should care about him.
And all Jolene Blalock does in this movie is briefly show off both her boobs and how bad her hair looks in corn rows.Slow Burn is a movie where people you don't care about tell stories about other people you don't care about until springing a surprise ending you still don't care about.