Susan Granger’s review of “Out of Time” (MGM)
This slick crime melodrama re-teams the “Training Day” duo of Denzel Washington and Eva Mendes. Set on Florida’s steamy Gold Coast, he plays Matt Lee Whitlock, police chief of Banyan Key; she’s Alex, his estranged wife who’s also a detective. When there’s arson and a brutal double homicide, he becomes the prime suspect. Only the situation is far more complicated. It seems Matt has been committing adultery with Ann (Sanaa Lathan), his high-school sweetheart who’s married to an abusive former football player (Dean Cain). And when he learns that she’s dying of cancer, he steals $500,000 in drug money from the evidence room. That’s so Ann can get alternative treatment in Switzerland – on the understanding that he’ll get that money back since she’s designated him as the beneficiary of a $1 million life-insurance policy. Yeah. First-time screenwriter Dave Collard has crafted a neo-noir’ish thriller with an overly-contrived plot that twists and turns as elusive parts of the puzzle slip into place. As a result, it’s more intriguing than credible. So director Carl Franklin (“Devil in a Blue Dress,” “High Crimes”) uses every cinematic trick-of-the-trade to try to keep the tension taut – with the aid of cinematographer Theo Van de Sande. Although not totally believable, Denzel Washington is persuasive, as is the rest of the cast. Which means the characters are more convincing than the circumstances in which they find themselves. And Josh Billingsley offers some needed comic relief as the medical examiner. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Out of Time” is a sultry, suspenseful 6. If you’re a fan of this genre, you’ll be able to trace this film’s antecedents to “No Way Out” and “Body Heat.” Too bad it doesn’t measure up to either.
