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| released = October 26, 2007
| released = October 26, 2007
| runtime = 123 minutes
| runtime = 123 minutes
| country = {{Film US}}
| country = United States
| language = English
| language = English
| budget = $18,000,000{{Citation needed|date=January 2010}}
| budget = $18,000,000{{Citation needed|date=January 2010}}

Revision as of 07:01, 21 June 2012

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
Theatrical release poster
Directed bySidney Lumet
Written byKelly Masterson
Produced byMichael Cerenzie
Brian Linse
William S. Gilmore
Paul Parmar
StarringPhilip Seymour Hoffman
Ethan Hawke
Albert Finney
Marisa Tomei
Rosemary Harris
Amy Ryan
CinematographyRon Fortunato
Edited byTom Swartwout
Music byCarter Burwell
Distributed byTHINKFilm
Release date
October 26, 2007
Running time
123 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$18,000,000[citation needed]
Box office$25,005,257

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead is a 2007 crime drama written by Kelly Masterson and directed by Sidney Lumet, his last feature film before he died in 2011.[1] The film stars Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei, and Albert Finney. The title comes from the Irish saying: "May you be in heaven a full half-hour before the devil knows you're dead." The film unfolds non-linearly, repeatedly going back and forth in time, with some scenes shown from various points of view.

The film received critical acclaim, and was selected as one of 2007's ten most influential American films by the American Film Institute at the 2007 AFI Awards.

Plot

Note: The story is explained here in its chronological order, rather than as it is presented in the film.

Andy Hanson (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is a finance executive at a real estate firm in New York City. Facing an upcoming audit, which he knows will reveal that he has embezzled thousands from his employer, Andy decides to escape to Brazil (which the film claims has no extradition treaty with the United States), but desperately needs money to establish himself in Rio. Andy has spent all the money he has stolen paying for drugs, hence his need for a new and immediate source of cash to set up shop in Rio. His brother Hank (Ethan Hawke) needs money to pay child support (which he is three months' behind on) and his daughter's private school tuition. Meanwhile, Hank has been having a long-standing affair with Andy's wife, Gina (Marisa Tomei), who has been unsatisfied with her marriage. Of the two brothers, Hank is well-meaning, but weak-willed and cowardly, easily dominated by his stronger-willed older brother, Andy, who is a ruthless schemer. Andy in turn harbours enormous resentment that his younger and more attractive brother always received more love and affection from his parents' than he did during childhood.

Andy devises a plan to rob their parents' jewelry store, to which Hank reluctantly agrees. Andy argues that he cannot go himself because he has been in the neighborhood recently, and could therefore be recognized. They assume that only Doris, an elderly woman who works for their parents, will be in the store. Andy states that just a toy gun is needed and that it is a victimless crime, because insurance will fully compensate their parents for the stolen items. Andy plans to fence the jewelry via a New York City dealer his father knows, and expects to net about $120,000 from the robbery.

Without consulting Andy, Hank hires Bobby Lasorda (Brian F. O'Byrne), an acquaintance who is an experienced thief, to help him in the robbery, as he is too frightened to carry out the crime alone. Bobby reveals a real gun and decides he will commit the robbery himself; Hank just needs to wait in the car. Unbeknownst to the robbers, the brothers' mother Nanette (Rosemary Harris) happens to be filling in for Doris. The robbery goes awry when Nanette pulls a hidden gun on Bobby, causing a shootout; Bobby dies on the scene, and Nanette falls into a coma, dying a week later in the hospital after her husband Charles (Albert Finney) agrees to take her off life support. Charles, unsatisfied with the police's indifference, decides to investigate on his own, and he becomes obsessed with finding information about the crime and others involved in it.

Shortly after the botched robbery, Hank is confronted by Bobby's brother-in-law Dex (Michael Shannon), who demands financial compensation for Bobby's death to provide for his sister, Chris (Aleksa Palladino), Bobby's widow.

While Andy is away from his office dealing with his mother's death, his superiors at work repeatedly try to contact him regarding irregularities in his department's accounts that have been revealed by the audit. At the wake for Nanette, Andy and Charles have a complex and emotional exchange, wherein Charles states he loves Andy despite their long-standing differences; Andy says he has always felt like an outsider in his father's house. When Andy questions his biological heritage, Charles slaps him. Andy and Gina immediately depart, and on the drive home Andy has an emotional breakdown over his relationship with his father. Later, at home, Gina tells Andy his boss has been trying to get in touch with him, and expresses her frustration with their marriage and Andy's growing coldness. Andy, preoccupied with covering up his embezzlement and trying to help Hank deal with Dex's blackmail, hardly reacts when Gina announces she is leaving him. Her desperate attempt to extract an emotional response from him – revealing her affair with Hank – fails, and she leaves.

Charles, searching for information about the robbery, visits the same fence Andy had contacted in New York City. After an acrimonious exchange that indicates Charles and the jeweler have known and disliked each other for decades, the jeweler hands Andy's business card to Charles, revealing to Charles that Andy recently came to him looking to fence some jewels. Charles immediately goes looking for Andy.

Andy decides to resolve the blackmail situation with Hank by robbing a heroin dealer that he frequents, and then escape abroad. At the dealer's apartment, Andy and Hank overpower the dealer and steal his money. Hank is shocked when Andy kills the dealer and a client who happened to be present. The brothers then go to pay off Dex, but Andy impulsively kills him from fear of continued blackmail. Andy appears ready to kill Chris (Bobby's common-in-law wife) when Hank objects. Andy turns the gun on Hank, revealing that he knows about Hank and Gina's relationship. Hank begs Andy to kill him, but Andy hesitates. As Andy pauses over whether to shoot his brother, Chris shoots Andy with her brother's gun, wounding him. Hank leaves his brother and guiltily leaves some of the money behind for Chris before fleeing with the money, drugs and paraphernalia they robbed from the heroin dealer.

After leaving the fence, Charles tailed Andy. He followed Andy from his apartment tower, watched as he went to Hank's apartment, then followed his sons to their meeting with Chris, and finally followed Andy to the hospital where the paramedics took his wounded son. Andy breaks down and vulnerably apologizes to his estranged father for everything, explaining Nanette's death was an accident. Charles seemingly accepts his apology. Charles then attaches Andy's heart monitor to himself and suffocates his son to death with a pillow. Andy struggles to stop his father, but in his weakened condition he is over-powered. As nurses rush to help Andy, Charles walks away. It is not made clear if Charles killed his son out of revenge for the death of Nanette, or if this was a mercy killing to spare his son a life in prison that he was sure to face for all the carnage that he caused, or perhaps both.

Cast

Production

Lumet made the decision to shoot Before the Devil Knows You're Dead on high definition video after experimenting with the format on the television series 100 Centre Street. At a press conference at the 2007 New York Film Festival, Lumet called shooting on film "a pain in the ass," and predicted that as soon as distributors and exhibitors could agree on a digital projection format, photographic film would be rendered obsolete.[2] Filming of the primary robbery scene in the film took place at the Bay Terrace Shopping Center in Bayside, Queens, New York.[3]

The scenes where Andy Hanson (Philip Seymour Hoffman) uses heroin were filmed in an apartment on a high floor on the southwest corner of Trump World Tower. This can be deduced from the location and angle of the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building seen through the window.

The scenes where Hank Hanson (Ethan Hawke) stops at a gas station to change in the restroom and uses a payphone to call Andy (Hoffman) were filmed on South Broadway in Yonkers, New York.

The climactic scene of the film where Andy Hanson (Hoffman) is shot was filmed on West 45th Street between 9th and 10th Avenues.

Release

The film premiered on September 6, 2007 at the Deauville Festival of American Cinema in France.[4] It was also shown at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 13, 2007.[4] It opened in France on September 26, 2007.[4] The film made its American debut on October 12, 2007 at the New York Film Festival.[4]

Critical reception

The film received very positive reviews from critics. As of January 18, 2008 on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 88% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 135 reviews.[5] On Metacritic, the film had an average score of 84 out of 100, based on 36 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".[6]

Time magazine's Richard Schickel named the film one of the top 10 films of 2007, ranking it at #3, saying "At one level the movie is a wonderfully intricate exploration of family dysfunction. At another, it's a coolly controlled examination of increasingly insane criminal ineptitude. Either way you look at it, this is a hypnotizing film from one of our great masters."[7] Roger Ebert gave the film four stars, calling it "superb" and its director, Sidney Lumet, a "living treasure."[8]

Top 10 lists

The film appeared on many critics' top 10 lists of the best films of 2007.[9]

Box office

The film opened in limited release in the United States on October 26, 2007 in two theaters, grossing $73,837 in its opening weekend.[10] In total, the film grossed over $25 million worldwide.[11]

Awards and honors

Home media

The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on April 15, 2008.

References

Notes
  1. ^ Berkvist, Robert (April 9, 2011). "Sidney Lumet, Director of American Film Classics, Dies at 86". The New York Times. Retrieved April 9, 2011.
  2. ^ "NYFF 2007: Sidney Lumet Joins the Death of Celluloid Brigade"
  3. ^ Bay Terrace Shopping Center retrieved on May 03, 2008
  4. ^ a b c d http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0292963/releaseinfo Retrieved 2007-10-30
  5. ^ "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead - Rotten Tomatoes". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 2007-12-31.
  6. ^ "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007): Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved 2007-12-31.
  7. ^ Schickel, Richard (December 9, 2007). "Top 10 Movies (Richard Schickel)". Time. Retrieved April 10, 2011.
  8. ^ Ebert, Roger (November 1, 2007). "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved April 10, 2011.
  9. ^ "Metacritic: 2007 Film Critic Top Ten Lists". Metacritic. Archived from the original on July 30, 2008. Retrieved February 13, 2011.
  10. ^ "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) - Weekend Box Office Results". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2007-10-30.
  11. ^ "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2009-09-24.


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