Review of The Son of No One (2011) by Mike W — 05 Mar 2012

Two or three decent performances (Holmes, Pacino, Tatum) and an intriguing hook are about the only notable things here. The main story is soon forgotten in favor of a cover up of same, ironically. In fact, the 1986-plot, which tells what actually happened, is much more gripping and would have made a better movie if that was all it was instead of being thrown together with a "16 years later" thing.

As for the cast, they are equally muddled. Tracy Morgan tries for a good dramatic debut, but thanks to the script he's reduced mainly to muttered whispers. Juliette Binoche is wasted as a supposedly crusading reporter, and Ray Liotta and Al Pacino are in normal-for-them cop mode, which is good for Pacinon but bad with Liotta.

Channing Tatum tries for credibility as a cop -- and succeeds, to a point -- but for the most part all he is allowed to do is glare at people (with vvarying degrees of meanness) who won't tell him what's going on.

Sadly, the biggest cast casualty is Katie Holmes, who appears in about fifteen to twenty minutes of the movie as Tatum's abandoned-in-favor-of-the-job wife. She does a terrific job, to be sure, but the actual impact her character has on events is so small that her presence is barely felt when she's offscreen.

Music and location are all new York cop rote, and the ending offers no real surprises other than a burning desire for a better movie.