Night Falls on Manhattan (1996)
Genre: Drama
Duration: 110 minuten
Country:
United States
Directed by: Sidney Lumet
Stars: Andy Garcia, Richard Dreyfuss and Lena Olin
IMDb score:
6,7 (9.494)
Releasedate: 22 October 1996
Night Falls on Manhattan plot
"In a city of nine million people is there room for one honest man?"
Sean Casey is a second-generation cop who rose to the rank of district attorney in Manhattan. He takes center stage with a sensational lawsuit against a major drug dealer charged with the attempted murder of a cop, who happens to be Sean's father. Before he can enjoy his victory, Sean sinks deep into a moral crisis when it turns out that his entire case was based on false evidence. He must face the shocking truth: The profession he reveres is tainted by crime, conspiracy and cover-ups.
Actors and actresses
Sean Casey
Liam Casey
Joey Allegretto
Peggy Lindstrom
Jordan Washington
Elihu Harrison
Morgenstern
Sam Vigoda
Judge Impelliteri
McGovern
Reviews & comments
Chainsaw
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- 8845 messages
- 3576 votes
Not a high flyer, this somewhat later production by Lumet.
The cast list is actually the only impressive thing about the film. Garcia and Holm are convincing in the leading roles department, but it is Dreyfuss who manages to steal the show. There are also a number of very amusing supporting roles in Night Falls on Manhattan, including James Gandolfini, Colm Feore and a very strong (and quite underrated) Ron Leibman here.
Other than that, the film unfortunately offers very little. The film starts as a pretty standard police film, starts to get better later on (especially during the court case), and then collapses again at the end. Certainly towards the end there is very little energy left and the film only ripples on a bit. I also found the role of Lena Olin pretty meaningless and useless.
A mediocre and somewhat messy film, which is still quite watchable due to the excellent acting of a large part of the actors and the occasionally quite amusing story.
3 stars.
Translated from Dutch · View original
Onderhond
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- 87623 messages
- 12890 votes
Lifeless.
Sidney Lumet has not yet been able to convince me, and he does not succeed in doing so with this film either. It's all so standard and by the numbers that the film never manages to liven up, even if the genre changes regularly.
Holds somewhere in between a police and court film, with some political influences and a small fringe romance to add 10 minutes to the total running time. Corruption, a shootout, a thunder sermon, some clever lawyer talk. It is a concatenation of known material.
The problem is that Lumet is a very limited director and hardly knows how to add anything to what is shown. He then leans on the plot and the actors, but they are not too fascinating either. Especially Iam Holm is not convincing at all.
And so 110 minutes are way too long for this vehicle. It doesn't get really dramatic or boring, but I can't be much more positive about it.
1.5*
Translated from Dutch · View original
scorsese
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- 13237 messages
- 11127 votes
Good film in which a starting lawyer gets an important case when his father, a police officer, is shot. Typical material for a film by Sidney Lumet and perhaps therefore not very surprising. But a good story with well-developed characters in which work and private life are opposed to each other. The entire cast puts on a great performance. Easily 3.5 stars.
Translated from Dutch · View original
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