Editor Reviews:

Product Description:
Master filmmaker Sidney Lumet (The Verdict Dog Day Afternoon Serpico) scores big with this absorbing suspense thriller. Oscar®-winner* Philip Seymour Hoffman is Andy an overextended payroll executive who lures his younger brother Hank (Ethan Hawke) into a larcenous scheme: the pair will rob a suburban mom-and-pop jewelry store that appears to be the quintessential easy target. The problem is the store owners are Andy and Hank's real mom and pop and when the seemingly perfect crime goes awry the damage sends them hurtling toward a shattering climax. System Requirements:LENGTH: 117 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA/PSYCHOLOGICAL DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 014381487527 Manufacturer No: CAP4875DVD

Amazon.com:
Sidney Lumet’s Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead is an exceptionally dark story about a crime gone wrong and the complicated reasons behind it. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke are outstanding as brothers whose mutual love-hate relationship subtly colors their agreement to rob their own parents’ jewelry store, and more explicitly affects the anxious aftermath of their villainy when their mother (Rosemary Harris) ends up shot. Hoffman’s steely, emotionally locked-up Andy, despite pulling down six figures as a corporate executive, is supporting an expensive drug habit while trying to leave the country with his depressed wife, Gina (Marisa Tomei). Hank (Hawke), a whipped dog of low intelligence, owes back alimony and child support to his ex-spouse. Both men need money and agree to rip off their parents' business, a decision that goes awry and puts both men in various kinds of jeopardy while their mother remains comatose and their father (Albert Finney) lurches along trying to make sense of anything. Writer Kelly Masterson's screenplay employs a perhaps now-overly-familiar time-shifting tactic, jumping around the chronology of the story's events and replaying scenes from different vantage points. The effect is a little tedious but successfully deconstructs the film's drama in a way that shows how such terrible events are directly linked to family dysfunction, old wounds between parent and child, between siblings, that fester into full-blown tragedy. Eighty-three-year-old director Lumet (Serpico) employs bleached colors and scenes of blunt sexuality and violence, adding to the moral rudderlessness and banality of this airless world. If Devil feels a little reductive and insistently grim, it is also a generally persuasive work by an old master. --Tom Keogh

Rating : - Frantic, explosive, and poetic - begining to end!
Sidney Lumet's "Before the Devil knows your Dead' is a whirlwind movie with surprises at every corner. Very well written by Kelly Masterson, the storyline relishes in reality, while the characters develop very believably throughout the movie. No black magic here, this movie is all to real. Director Lumet's very satisfying directing makes this movie surprises even Lumet fans.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman plays Andy. A successful Payroll Manager with a beautiful wife, played by Marisa Tomei, and some expensive drug habits. Ethan Hawke plays Hank, Andy's troubled younger brother: A down-trotten divorce' who spends more money in bars than paying for his child support. The two brothers. Besides their lineage, they share a more common problem - money. To fix this, Andy hatches a plan to rob a jewelry store - only the jewelry store is the one owned by their parents. Since they both know the stores layout, this seems at first to be an easy job. Andy gives Hank an 'advance' to hire a thug to rob the store early one morning. Anticipating only an elderly woman employee opening the store, Hank eagerly waits in the get-away car while the hired hand walks in to take the loot; an estimated $500-$600k.

Then the plan goes way awry.

The simplicity quickly turns into a family tragedy while the characters themselves begin play a game of cat & mouse with the law, their family, and with themselves; avoiding their obligations and while confronting a growingly uncertain future.

Hoffman's acting abilities are remarkable in this movie. His character 'Andy' is all too believable and all to human. Too, Ethan Hawke's apprehensive and confused 'Hank' shows Hawke coming into form as a Hollywood A-list actor. He was perfect for this part. Marisa Tomei's frank, and vivid scenes, show her amazing acting talents as a trophy-wife having an affair while a drug-induced husband sails through life giving her mere luxury; without fulfilling her basic needs only her lover (Hank) affords her.

Albert Finney plays a tour-de-force as Andy and Hank's Dad. His character's persistence unravels the truth, and ultimate discovery, that tears the family apart. The ending of " Before the Devil..." is pure poetic justice.

While not a box office standout, this movie deserves more credit than it received. "Before the Devil knows your Dead' is a masterpiece: Both engrossing and, most importantly, very believable.

I highly recommend this movie!