Easy’s further ventures reveal a political scandal that could ruin a few people’s lives – and cost him his own.įranklin’s screenplay, which he based on Mosley’s source novel, may seem convoluted on the page. The young would-be detective would rather leave matters closed now that murder is a key ingredient in the mystery, but Dewitt won’t let him off the hook so easily.
Accompanying her to a house where Daphne insists on meeting a man she knows, Easy is thrown for a loop to find the man bloodied and sprawled dead. Easy meets with her, but no sooner are introductions made when Daphne pulls Easy down yet another rabbit hole. Easy begins his search and, soon enough, finds himself on the receiving end of some racially-charged violence, police brutality, and the amorous advances of his pal’s girlfriend.ĭaphne gets wind that she is being sought after and contacts Easy. Her mysterious disappearance has political ramifications for her husband, who had plans to run for mayor of LA. One day, while sitting at his local bar, he meets DeWitt (Tom Sizemore), who hires Easy to track down a woman named Daphne (Jennifer Beals). The arresting visuals are further augmented by the skillful editing that always offers room for the beautiful scenery and the action.Įasy Rawlins (Washington) is an ex-army vet looking for work. Franklin’s film is handsomely decked out in period detail that refers to LA’s underground jazz club and speakeasy haunts of the ’40s. Already an accomplished actor with an Academy Award, Washington lent an earnest and charming delineation to his character in a film that has proven one of his most popular entries in his repertoire.įlanked by an equally impressive cast (a poised and sultry Jennifer Beals, in particular), Devil in a Blue Dress works a magnetic tandem between actor and scenery, demonstrating the powerful (if often overlooked) truth in the environmental dynamics that assist an actor’s onscreen negotiations. Released to wide acclaim in the fall of 1995, it was one of just many films to come and go during the mid-’90s intended to push its lead, Denzel Washington, into stardom. Helmed by the delegating hand of a self-possessed filmmaker, Devil in a Blue Dress’ languid and smoky atmosphere of menace and desperation finds a most suitable pressure of pace and action. Based on Walter Mosley’s hit 1990 novel of the same name, Carl Franklin’s neo-noir exercise, Devil in a Blue Dress, didn’t so much reinvent the noir genre as it did polish its finer points.
0 kommentar(er)
