| Subcategories | | Grade Level (feature_five_browse-bin) | | • | Preschool |
| | | |
|
|
|
| 
 enlarge | Director: Sidney Lumet
Actors: Albert Finney, Marisa Tomei, Rosemary Harris, Ethan Hawke, Philip Seymour Hoffman
Studio: ThinkFilm
Category: DVD
List Price: $19.98
Buy Used: $5.27
You Save: $14.71 (74%)
New (55) Used (60) Collectible (1) from $5.27
Rating:  99 reviews
Sales Rank: 2976
Format: Ac-3, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Ntsc, Widescreen
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Region: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 112 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.7
MPN: IMEDCAP4875D
UPC: 014381487527
EAN: 0014381487527
ASIN: B00112S8RS
Theatrical Release Date: 2007
Release Date: April 15, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: 100% GUARANTEED! Fast shipping on more than 1,000,000 Book, Video, Video Game & Music titles all in one location! Discover Your Entertainment at goHastings.
Tell A Friend
Add to Wishlist
Add to Wedding Registry
Add to Baby Registry
|
| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 26-30 of 50
 Grim, depressing film of the death of a horrible family July 27, 2008
Scott Schiefelbein (Portland, Oregon United States)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Sidney Lumet's "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" is a two-hour romp for any sadist who revels in emotional rather than physical torment. It's hard to say if this is a good movie - I am in such a foul mood after watching it that I can't appreciate its merits.
I guess if the movie aims to make you depressed, and you emerge depressed, then it must be good. Oh well.
A first-rate cast elevates a dark story. Two brothers, Andy (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and Hank (Ethan Hawke), are circling their respective drains. On the surface, Hank is the worse off - divorced and crippled by child support payments and an incapacity to think for himself. Andy is apparently more successful - a high-flying corporate executive, married to Marisa Tomei (who we see a *lot* of), and suave in his chunky way. But in many ways, Andy is much worse off.
To save themselves, Andy and Hank agree to rob their parents' suburban jewelry store. This goes badly, and the movie follows Hank and Andy's downfall. This is dark, tortured stuff as the botched crime rips open old family wounds and exposes new secrets.
This is a feel-bad movie. Unfortunately, unlike "Boys Don't Cry," this isn't a great feel-bad movie. A chopped chronology reeks of dozens of indy movies since "Pulp Fiction," and there is hardly a moment of hope or levity to lighten the mood one iota. Save for the good performances, this movie is not a recommendation.
unrelentingly grim course to self destruction July 25, 2008
Robert J. Crawford (Balmette Talloires, France)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Wow, you can't get much worse than this: a family heads towards utter oblivion and it is completely believable. This is nothing short of agony to watch, bringing up the deepest fears that one might feel about the trajectory of one's life. This is on a par with Death of a Salesman, but updated to include drugs and murder. It is an obvious artistic success, though it might give you insomnia and anxiety. If you want to experience these things, I would recommend this film.
 Film noir american style July 21, 2008
Reader (Chicago, IL USA)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
The storytelling in this film is worth comparing to a modern Shakespeare. This is not just some sort of tragedy. This is a tragedy of gigantic proportions. We see fantastic cast of actors (Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei and Albert Finney) assembled in this sad family saga. Two brothers, one seemingly well off and married to a beautiful woman and the other a complete loser without career, money and divorced, agree to commit "victimless crime" by robbing their parent's jewelry store. The idea is that the insurance would cover the loss of the jewelry that is estimated to $500,000-$600,000 value. Brothers would take care of their financial responsibilites and start their lives fresh. At least that is the plan, until everything not only fails but spirals down with dizzing velocity. I have not seen film this good since "All the King's Men" came out couple of years ago. This film will shake you in more ways than one.
Frantic, explosive, and poetic - begining to end! July 12, 2008
Steve Bradford (Frederick, Maryland USA)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Sidney Lumet's "Before the Devil knows your Dead' is a whirlwind movie with surprises at every corner. Very well written by Kelly Masterson, the storyline relishes in reality, while the characters develop very believably throughout the movie. No black magic here, this movie is all to real. Director Lumet's very satisfying directing makes this movie surprises even Lumet fans.
Phillip Seymour Hoffman plays Andy. A successful Payroll Manager with a beautiful wife, played by Marisa Tomei, and some expensive drug habits. Ethan Hawke plays Hank, Andy's troubled younger brother: A down-trotten divorce' who spends more money in bars than paying for his child support. The two brothers. Besides their lineage, they share a more common problem - money. To fix this, Andy hatches a plan to rob a jewelry store - only the jewelry store is the one owned by their parents. Since they both know the stores layout, this seems at first to be an easy job. Andy gives Hank an 'advance' to hire a thug to rob the store early one morning. Anticipating only an elderly woman employee opening the store, Hank eagerly waits in the get-away car while the hired hand walks in to take the loot; an estimated $500-$600k.
Then the plan goes way awry.
The simplicity quickly turns into a family tragedy while the characters themselves begin play a game of cat & mouse with the law, their family, and with themselves; avoiding their obligations and while confronting a growingly uncertain future.
Hoffman's acting abilities are remarkable in this movie. His character 'Andy' is all too believable and all to human. Too, Ethan Hawke's apprehensive and confused 'Hank' shows Hawke coming into form as a Hollywood A-list actor. He was perfect for this part. Marisa Tomei's frank, and vivid scenes, show her amazing acting talents as a trophy-wife having an affair while a drug-induced husband sails through life giving her mere luxury; without fulfilling her basic needs only her lover (Hank) affords her.
Albert Finney plays a tour-de-force as Andy and Hank's Dad. His character's persistence unravels the truth, and ultimate discovery, that tears the family apart. The ending of " Before the Devil..." is pure poetic justice.
While not a box office standout, this movie deserves more credit than it received. "Before the Devil knows your Dead' is a masterpiece: Both engrossing and, most importantly, very believable.
I highly recommend this movie!
May you be in heaven half an hour... July 11, 2008
Dennis Littrell (SoCal)
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
This is a thoroughly diabolical tale of just how bad things can go wrong. A simple robbery. Pick up some serious change. Get our finances together and everything will be hunky-dory. But--mom and pop's jewelry store? No problem. Insurance pays for it all. No guns. Nobody gets hurt. Easy money.
Older, more successful (it would appear) brother Andy (Philip Seymour Hoffman) has a few minor problems. Heroin addiction, cocaine habituation. A wife (Marisa Tomei) that...well, he can't seem to perform for. His flat belly days long gone. Younger, sweet, slightly dim-witted brother, Hank (Ethan Hawke) with a few dinero problems of his own. Behind in child support payments for his daughter, in debt to friends and relatives, not exactly wowing them in the work of work, etc.
Sydney Lumet, in this performance at the age of 82 (!), directs and gets it 99.99 percent right, which is hard to do in a thriller. I have seen more thrillers than I can remember and most of the time the director gets the movie printed and lives with the plot holes, the improbabilities, the cheesy scenes, and the hurry-up ending. Here Lumet makes a thriller like it's a work of art. Every detail is perfect. The acting is superb. The plot has no holes. The story rings true and clear and represents a tale about human frailty that would honor the greatest filmmakers and even the Bard himself.
Hoffman of course is excellent. When you don't have marquee, leading man presence, you have to get by on talent, workmanship and pure concentration. Ethan Hawke, who is no stranger to the sweet, little guy role, adds a layer of desperation and all too human incompetence to the part so that we don't know whether to pity him or trash him. Albert Finney plays the father of the wayward sons with a kind of steely intensity that belies his age. And Marisa Tomei, who has magical qualities of sexiness to go along with her unique creativity, manages to be both vulnerable and hard as nails as Andy's two timing wife. (But who could blame her?)
It's almost a movie reviewer's sacrilege to give a commercial thriller five or ten stars, but if you study this film, as all aspiring film makers would be well advised to do, you will notice the kind of excessive (according to most Hollywood producers) attention to detail that makes for real art--the sort of thing that only great artists can do, and indeed cannot help but do. (By the way, I think there were twenty producers on this film--well, maybe a dozen; check the credits.) All I can say in summation is, Way to go Sydney Lumet, author of a slew of excellent films, and to show such fidelity to your craft and your art at such an advanced age--kudos. May we all do half so well.
Okay, the 00.01 percent. It was unlikely that the father (Albert Finney) could have followed the cabs that Andy took around New York without somehow losing the tail. This is minor, and I wish all thrillers could have so small a blip. Also one wonders why Lumet decided not to tell us about the fate of Hank at the end. We can guess and guess. Perhaps his fate fell onto the cutting room floor. Perhaps Lumet was not satisfied with what was filmed and time ran out, and he just said, "Leave it like that. It really doesn't matter."
And I think it doesn't. What happens to Hank is not going to be good. He isn't the kind of guy who manages to run off to Mexico and is able to start a new life. He is the kind of guy who gets a "light" sentence of 10 to 20 and serves it and comes out a kind of shrunken human being who knows he wasn't really a man when he should have been.
See this for Sidney Lumet, one of Hollywood's best, director of The Pawnbroker (1964), The Group (1966), Serpico (1973), Dog Day Afternoon (1975), Network (1976), and many more.
|
|
|
