15 Minutes
2001 Directed by John Herzfeld
Synopsis
When Eastern European criminals Oleg and Emil come to New York City to pick up their share of a heist score, Oleg steals a video camera and starts filming their activities, both legal and illegal. When they learn how the American media circus can make a remorseless killer look like the victim and make them rich, they target media-savvy NYPD Homicide Detective Eddie Flemming and media-naive FDNY Fire Marshal Jordy Warsaw, the cops investigating their murder and torching of their former criminal partner, filming everything to sell to the local tabloid TV show "Top Story."
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Entertaining. Good story and action.
Recent reviews
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Only thing I remember about this is what it had a surprising ending. I guess it was a solid thriller, I dunno.
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Multi-layered, extremely ballsy and often genuinely fascinating film that, while it seems to attack things I feel are deeply original and realistic, is unfortunately racked with implausible routes to these ends and is sometimes shamefully convenient.
[3/15/13 note: I totally remember getting screamed at - yes, not exaggerating - by a customer at the now defunct Willow Grove Video Update. She felt sequences in the film too closely mirrored the (at the time) recent tragedy of NYC 9/11/01. How dare we stock this film without warning people. How dare we. (I probably forgot to mention that we *forced* her to watch it, Luduvico style.)
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Entertaining. Good story and action.
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This one's dedicated to the guy who sat behind me in the theater and clapped over the closing credits.
What a frenzied mess 15 Minutes is. It bears a lot of the imprimaturs of good intentions, not the least of which is the ruins to which it leads. To its credit, it features strong dramatic performances from Robert De Niro and Edward Burns and scores big in the scenes in which it hauls out the big guns and ratchets up the suspense. To its discredit ... well, the same attributes apply here, too.
To get why, let's break it down: A double killing brings a high-profile NYPD homicide cop Eddie Flemming (De Niro) onto the turf of young arson investigator…
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Ummmm no....
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Unusual concept that gets very interesting. The power of media
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Tired territory, poorly done.