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Before the Devil Knows You're Dead | 
 enlarge | Director: Sidney Lumet
Actors: Albert Finney, Marisa Tomei, Rosemary Harris, Ethan Hawke, Philip Seymour Hoffman
Studio: ThinkFilm
Category: DVD
List Price: $27.98
Buy Used: $6.97
You Save: $21.01 (75%)
New (56) Used (47) from $6.97
Avg. Customer Rating:  83 reviews
Sales Rank: 700
Format: Ac-3, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Ntsc, Widescreen
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 112
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.7
MPN: CAP4875DVD
UPC: 014381487527
EAN: 0014381487527
ASIN: B00112S8RS
Theatrical Release Date: 2007
Release Date: April 15, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: Ships next day
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Product Description
Master filmmaker Sidney Lumet (The Verdict Dog Day Afternoon Serpico) scores big with this absorbing suspense thriller. Oscar-winner* Philip Seymour Hoffman is Andy an overextended payroll executive who lures his younger brother Hank (Ethan Hawke) into a larcenous scheme: the pair will rob a suburban mom-and-pop jewelry store that appears to be the quintessential easy target. The problem is the store owners are Andy and Hank's real mom and pop and when the seemingly perfect crime goes awry the damage sends them hurtling toward a shattering climax. System Requirements:LENGTH: 117 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA/PSYCHOLOGICAL DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 014381487527 Manufacturer No: CAP4875DVD
Amazon.com
Sidney Lumet's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead is an exceptionally dark story about a crime gone wrong and the complicated reasons behind it. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke are outstanding as brothers whose mutual love-hate relationship subtly colors their agreement to rob their own parents' jewelry store, and more explicitly affects the anxious aftermath of their villainy when their mother (Rosemary Harris) ends up shot. Hoffman's steely, emotionally locked-up Andy, despite pulling down six figures as a corporate executive, is supporting an expensive drug habit while trying to leave the country with his depressed wife, Gina (Marisa Tomei). Hank (Hawke), a whipped dog of low intelligence, owes back alimony and child support to his ex-spouse. Both men need money and agree to rip off their parents' business, a decision that goes awry and puts both men in various kinds of jeopardy while their mother remains comatose and their father (Albert Finney) lurches along trying to make sense of anything. Writer Kelly Masterson's screenplay employs a perhaps now-overly-familiar time-shifting tactic, jumping around the chronology of the story's events and replaying scenes from different vantage points. The effect is a little tedious but successfully deconstructs the film's drama in a way that shows how such terrible events are directly linked to family dysfunction, old wounds between parent and child, between siblings, that fester into full-blown tragedy. Eighty-three-year-old director Lumet (Serpico) employs bleached colors and scenes of blunt sexuality and violence, adding to the moral rudderlessness and banality of this airless world. If Devil feels a little reductive and insistently grim, it is also a generally persuasive work by an old master. --Tom Keogh
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| Customer Reviews: Read 78 more reviews...
 Disturbing. August 17, 2008
I knew this film would be dark, but I wasn't prepared for how dark it turned out to be. The tension never lets up for almost two hours.
 great acting, great script, great pace August 15, 2008
This was noir-ish and enjoyable. The acting was superb and the story interesting. You will not regret watching this movie.
 The Family That Slays Together... August 9, 2008
This movie is about two loser brothers who plan to rob their parents' jewelry store. (How low can you go?) The mastermind (feeble mind) is the older brother, Andy, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman. Andy seems to have no redeeming qualities. Ethan Hawke is the younger brother, Hank, who has the backbone of a jellyfish. Albert Finney skillfully plays the bad boys' father.
It's certainly a downer. There's no sunshine in these lives. Everybody is greedy and manipulative. Andy's wife and Hank's ex-wife are cold and demanding.
After an attention-grabbing beginning, I soon found myself wondering how this mess would be resolved. So I kept watching, even though the film followed a confusing skip-around format. I found the conclusion disappointing, but somehow fitting for this ultra-dark work.
The acting was beyond reproach. But a little levity, or even a righteous detective, would have gone a long way.
 Do not believe the possitive reviews... This is horrible! August 6, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Do not believe the positive reviews... This is horrible!
Why do people still believe Ethan Hawke has talent?
Thank God for Fast Forward should've been the title! July 31, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
Too make this short and bittersweet: Before the Devil Knows Your Dead is virtually unwatchable. Lumet relied on a lazy and tiresome series of flashbacks (think Vantage Point which does the same and is equally unwatchable) to tell the most depressing and unrealistic story I've ever been asked to suspend my disbelief for. The flashbacks are the laziest and most annoying way to try and narrate a story and it winds up being tedium instead of building drama. I will forget this garbage and instead remember Lumet for his earlier masterpieces.
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