The Suspect Review

3 out of 5

Thriller

The Verdict

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Crime-thriller fans who don’t mind a messy story for a strong lead performance. Most viewers can skip it.

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Synopsis

A Midwest town experiences a bank robbery and is unable to figure out who did it. The local police find and contain a mysterious character walking around town claiming to be looking at buying a house. The events that happen next would question the truth and even their suspect.

Spoiler Warning!!! Full Review Below

Full Review (Spoilers)

Producers: Scott Aronson

The Good

Mehki Phifer did well in this role. He depicted a character that was heartbroken about his daughter’s condition. He would stop at nothing to get help for her.

The suspect idea was an interesting plot point. You really couldn’t tell at the beginning of the movie if there was one suspect of African American descent or two. They both switched in pulling off critical points in the job. Every detail was planned out and executed almost to perfection.

The Bad

This movie suffered from poorly placed flashbacks. The flashbacks came during weird times and really didn’t sync well with the story. Instead of clearing things up for the viewer, it made things more confusing.

The ending of this movie was horrible. Phifer’s character had a death wish so he could have his daughter collect the insurance money. The terms of the death made it very weird. The twist came from left field and didn’t fit properly in the movie.

One of the major weak points about this movie was too many plot twists. When you first meet Phifer’s character you think that he robbed banks. A twist made it to where he’s returning the money and letting the authorities know that it’s a social experiment. Another twist happens when you realize he’s returning fake money he received from a counterfeiter and keeping the real money. This would make you think he’s collecting it for his daughter…False. Final twist, he put out an insurance policy that goes in effect when he dies from uncommon events. If you’re confused by reading all of the twists then imagine watching it.

Originally published on the Bring On The Reviews Blogspot blog on June 12, 2014.

The Suspect (2014) Cast and Details

The Suspect (2014) is directed by Stuart Connelly and stars Mekhi Phifer, Sterling K. Brown and William Sadler. It runs 98 minutes and is unrated. You can look up the full cast and crew on IMDb. You might also like my Edge of Tomorrow review.

DC's Hypothetical Corner

Let’s say I change one thing. Maybe that one thing will make this movie better or more watchable.

It would be a different movie if Brown’s character didn’t stop to buy glasses. He would have lived and made it back to the police station. They could have both lived and continue to pull of the elaborate bank heists. Each town they went to bought into the experiment and didn’t suspect anything after they left. Imagine if Samuel L. Jackson was one of the suspects and Lawrence Fishburne played the other suspects. Think of it as the Jackson/Fishburne mistaken identity interview all over again.

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