Righteous Kill is an upcoming movie directed by Jon Avnet bringing together in its cast Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. A second official trailer has been unveiled for Righteous Kill. Turk and Rooster, two aging NYPD detectives and longtime partners, are hunting a serial killer who is murdering sociopathic criminals. They both have personal issues, and when they start working with a younger investigative team, Perez and Riley, tensions between the two teams is inevitable, especially since Turk is now living.

Righteous Kill is a 2008 American buddy copcrimethriller film directed by Jon Avnet, and starring Al Pacino and Robert De Niro.^[2] This is the third film in which both De Niro and Pacino appear in starring roles. Righteous Kill also features John Leguizamo, Carla Gugino, Donnie Wahlberg, Brian Dennehy, and 50 Cent.^[3][4] The film was released in the United States on September 12, 2008.

Plot[edit]

Police psychologists review recordings of a man (Robert De Niro), who states his name as Detective David Fisk, the 'Poetry Boy' killer. The Poetry Boy earned the moniker for his modus operandi of murdering criminals and leaving short poems with their bodies. Fisk reveals that he looks up to his partner of almost 30 years, Detective Tom Cowan (who the audience is led to believe is the character portrayed by Al Pacino), and considers him to be his role model of how a cop should be. Pacino's character is known by the nickname 'Rooster' and De Niro's by 'Turk', and they are referred as such outside of the recordings.

These recordings provide a narrative, and the film opens with the tenth victim, a drug dealer named Robert 'Rambo' Brady (Rob Dyrdek). Turk and Rooster investigate the murder with the less-experienced detectives Karen Corelli (Carla Gugino), Simon Perez (John Leguizamo), and Ted Riley (Donnie Wahlberg). When they find a poem on the body, the cops link it to Poetry Boy.

As Poetry Boy murders acquitted rapist Jonathan Van Luytens and Father Connell, a Catholic priest and child molester (whose victims included Poetry Boy himself), tensions escalate between Turk, Corelli, and Perez. Turk is now living with Corelli, who happens to be Perez's ex-girlfriend. Poetry Boy assaults an intended fourteenth victim, Russian mobster Yevgeny Magulat (who survives), and goes on to shoot at Perez's house and rape Corelli. Perez and Riley suspect Turk of being Poetry Boy due to his marksmanship skills and psych evaluations, so they arrange a secretly supervised meeting between Turk and suspected drug dealer Marcus 'Spider' Smith (50 Cent), during which Turk supposedly must kill him. Turk proves his innocence during an encounter with this drug dealer as he has the 'wrong' gun and humiliating but obviously inappropriate poem. After Perez and Riley leave the scene unsatisfied, Rooster kills Spider. During this scrape, Rooster inadvertently drops his journal.

Turk stumbles upon and reads Rooster's journal; Rooster claims Spider as Poetry Boy's fourteenth victim. Rooster puts Turk in front of a video camera and forces him to read the journal. At this point, it is revealed that the narration set Turk up as a red herring, and Rooster is the actual Poetry Boy. Turk's name is actually Tom Cowan, and Rooster's is David Fisk. Rooster lost his faith in the justice system when Turk planted a gun at the house of acquitted child molester and murderer Charles Randall (Frank John Hughes), convicting him. This leads Rooster to take the law into his own hands as the vigilante serial killer known as Poetry Boy.

When Turk finishes, he chases Rooster to a construction site. Rooster fires aimlessly to convince Turk to report that the Poetry Boy is assaulting a police officer, resisting arrest, and fleeing, but Turk resists. When Rooster takes aim at Turk, Turk fires, striking Rooster in the chest. Turk calls for an ambulance, but Rooster begs Turk to let him die. After some hesitation, Turk calls off the paramedics, allowing Rooster to succumb to his wounds. He is last shown coaching a Police Athletic League baseball team as Corelli looks on.

Cast[edit]

• Robert De Niro as Detective Thomas 'Tom' Cowan/'Turk'
• Al Pacino as Detective David Fisk/'Rooster'/The 'Poetry Boy' Killer
• 50 Cent (Curtis Jackson) as Marcus Smith/'Spider'
• Carla Gugino as Detective Karen Corelli
• John Leguizamo as Detective Simon Perez
• Donnie Wahlberg as Detective Theodore Riley
• Brian Dennehy as Lieutenant Hingis
• Trilby Glover as Jessica
• Melissa Leo as Cheryl Brooks
• Oleg Taktarov as Yevgeny Mugalat
• Sterling K. Brown as Rogers
• Alan Blumenfeld as Martin Baum
• Frank John Hughes as Charles Randall
• Rob Dyrdek as Robert Brady/'Rambo'

Reception[edit]

Critical response[edit]

The film has received mainly negative reviews. Rotten Tomatoes reported that 18% of critics gave positive reviews based on 146 reviews.^[5]Metacritic gave the film a 36/100 approval rating based on 27 reviews.^[6]

The Times included Righteous Kill on its 100 Worst Films of 2008 list.

Keith Phipps of The Onion's A.V. Club said, 'The novelty of watching De Niro and Pacino team up wears off pretty quickly, [with them] trudging through a thriller that would have felt warmed over in 1988. Director Jon Avnet doesn't offer much compensation for the absent suspense.'^[7]James Berardinelli of ReelViews gave the film two stars (out of four), saying: 'This isn't just generic material; it's generic material with a dumb ending, and the director is a journeyman, not a craftsman. .. Its failure to live up to even modest expectations is a blow. There's nothing righteous to be found here.'^[8]

Civilization vi trainer. If you choose the French civilization, the name of the cities chosen by the game will be Paris, Lyonne or Nice. The names are usually typical of that civilization. The game provides names for the cities. The civics are one important of the game so you better work on them.Each civilization is divided up into cities.

Ken Fox of TV Guide also gave Righteous Kill a score of two stars out of four, saying: 'The entire movie is one big build-up to a twist that, while not exactly cheating, plays an awfully cheap trick. To get there, writer Russel Gewirtz and director John Avnet sacrifice mystery, suspense, sensible editing and everything else one expects to find in a police thriller just to keep the audience off-guard. It's not worth it, and the first real pairing of De Niro and Pacino is utterly wasted.'^[9] (The two actors had co-starred in The Godfather Part II without appearing on screen together and in Heat, sharing the screen in just two scenes.)

Claudia Puig of USA Today gave the film one and a half stars out of four, saying: 'By the time the movie reaches its protracted conclusion, it feels like a slog. Pacino has a few funny lines, as does Leguizamo, but not nearly enough to save the film from collapsing under the weight of its own self-righteous tedium.'^[10]Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave Righteous Kill one star out of four, saying: 'Some people think Robert De Niro and Al Pacino would be a kick to watch just reading a phone book. Well, bring on that phone book. Righteous Kill, a.k.a. The Al and Bob Show, is a cop flick with all the drama of Law & Order: AARP.'^[11] However, Richard Roeper gave the film 3 stars out of 4 and Tim Evans for Sky Movies remarked that the film was '.. an effective whodunnit but—more importantly—it poses refined, complex questions about how the law operates in a so-called civilised society.'^[12]

Al Pacino earned a Razzie Award nomination for Worst Actor for his performance in the film (and for 88 Minutes, also directed by Jon Avnet), but 'lost' the award to Mike Myers for The Love Guru.^[13]

Box office[edit]

On its opening weekend, Righteous Kill opened at #3, grossing $16,288,361, behind The Family That Preys and Burn After Reading respectively.^[14] Its final box office tally was approximately $40 million domestic (US/Canada) and $38 million international for a total of $78 million.^[15] By comparison, an earlier movie that paired De Niro and Pacino, Heat, grossed over $180 million worldwide. Overture Films paid $12 million to acquire the film,^[16] and stated that they would be happy if this film could gross $25 million in the United States theatrically.^[17]

Home media[edit]

The DVD and Blu-ray^[18] of the film were released on January 6, 2009. About 954,000 DVD units have been sold so far, gathering $15,828,184 in revenue.^[19] This does not include Blu-ray sales.

See also[edit]

References[edit]

1. ^'Box Office Mojo'. Box Office Mojo. September 8, 2008. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
2. ^'Pacino and De Niro pair up again'. BBC. May 18, 2007. Retrieved May 18, 2007.
3. ^'50 Cent's Righteous Kill, Talks New Movie, Dispels Rumors'. August 29, 2007. Archived from the original on October 30, 2007.
4. ^'50 Cent Lands Role In New De Niro/Pacino Flick'. Rap Basement. Archived from the original on 2007-06-26.
5. ^'Righteous Kill (2008)'. Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved September 14, 2008.
6. ^'Righteous Kill (2008): Reviews'. Metacritic. Retrieved September 14, 2008.
7. ^Phipps, Keith (September 11, 2008). 'Righteous Kill'. The A.V. Club. The Onion. Retrieved April 4, 2020.
8. ^Berardinelli, James. 'Righteous Kill'. ReelViews. Retrieved April 4, 2020.
9. ^Righteous Kill Review, Ken Fox, TV Guide, 2008
10. ^Puig, Claudia (September 11, 2008). ''Righteous Kill' just feels wrong'. USA Today. Gannett. Retrieved September 14, 2008.
11. ^Travers, Peter (September 11, 2008). 'Righteous Kill'. Rolling Stone. Wenner Media. Retrieved April 4, 2020.
12. ^http://www.rottentomatoes.com/critic/tim-evans/movies
13. ^Wilson, John (2009). '29th Annual Golden Raspberry (Razzie) Award 'Winners''. Home of the Golden Raspberry Award Foundation. Golden Raspberry Award Foundation. Archived from the original on April 27, 2009. Retrieved April 4, 2020.
14. ^'Weekend Box Office Results from September 12–14, 2008'. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved September 14, 2008.
15. ^'Righteous Kill (2008)'. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved December 20, 2008.
16. ^McClintock, Pamela (September 14, 2008). 'Variety'. Variety. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
17. ^Winters, Rebecca (September 12, 2008). 'Righteous Kill Pairing Earns Hollywood Shrug'. Time. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
18. ^'RIGHTEOUS KILL—On DVD and Blu-Ray™ January 6, 2009'. Righteouskill-themovie.com. January 6, 2009. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
19. ^'Righteous Kill - DVD Sales'. The Numbers. Retrieved September 10, 2012.

External links[edit]

• Righteous Kill on IMDb
• Righteous Kill at AllMovie
• Righteous Kill at Box Office Mojo
• Righteous Kill at Rotten Tomatoes

Academy Award winners Robert De Niro (Raging Bull) and Al Pacino (Scent of a Woman) star as a pair of veteran New York City police detectives on the trail of a vigilante serial killer in the adrenaline fueled psychological thriller Righteous Kill, directed by Jon Avnet (Red Corner, Fried Green Tomatoes) and written by Russell Gewirtz (Inside Man). The cast also features hip-hop superstar Curtis Jackson (Get Rich or Die Tryin’). After 30 years as partners in the pressure cooker environment of the NYPD, highly decorated Detectives David Fisk and Thomas Cowan should be ready for retirement, but aren’t. Before they can hang up their badges, they are called in to investigate the murder of a notorious pimp, which appears to have ties to a case they solved years before. Like the original murder, the victim is a suspected criminal whose body is found accompanied by a four line poem justifying the killing. When additional crimes take place, it becomes clear the detectives are looking for a serial killer, one who targets criminals that have fallen through the cracks of the judicial system. His mission is to do what the cops can’t do on their own—take the culprits off the streets for good.

The similarities between the recent killings and their earlier case raise a nagging question: Did they put the wrong man behind bars?. Genre:.

Director: Jon Avnet. Cast: Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Curtis Jackson, Brian Dennehy, John Leguizamo.