True Crime

Those offended by the older-man/younger-woman trend in movies will get ticked off early at Clint Eastwood's True Crime, which true to its tabloid title poses portentous issues only to titillate with tongue-in-cheek absurdities. Hunched over in a bar, washed-up reporter Steve Everett -- played with over-the-hill Dirty Harry aplomb by Eastwood -- plants a big wet one on a 23-year-old cub reporter. It proves the kiss of death, as the woman promptly dies in a car crash, and Everett inherits her last assignment: a "human interest story" about convicted murderer Frank Beachum (Isaiah Washington), who's been sentenced to die at midnight. The puff piece gets Everett's investigative juices flowing, and to the dismay of his editors (Denis Leary and James Woods), he sets off à la Detective Callahan to exonerate his subject.

The crusty cynicism of Eastwood's performance, infused with a hearty dose of unapologetic dissipation, carries the story over its shameless coincidences and implausibilities -- even the most laughable of which, such as a last-minute car chase, seem served up with a wink. This sleazy candor allows Eastwood to get away with his manipulative melodramatics as well -- Beachum's teary farewells to his family (Lisa Gay Hamilton as his wife is outstanding in a role in which she mostly cries) are genuinely moving. Be that as it may, if Eastwood doesn't come up with a worthy movie soon, it'll be a crime for which he will be unforgiven.

-- Peter Keough