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| Genre: | Thriller |
| Year: | 1995 |
| Rating: | R |
| Length: | 1h 46mins |
| Cast: | Bryan Singer, Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Chazz Palminteri |
Few movie thrillers grip their audiences in the way this gritty but seductive caper flick does. Christopher McQuarrie's brilliantly structured, Academy Award-winning screenplay opens with a mysterious dock fire, the unexpected result of a botched hijacking that leaves the crime scene littered with corpses. Flashbacks reveal the participants as career criminals Gabriel Byrne, Stephen Baldwin, Kevin Pollak, Benicio Del Toro, and the conflagration's sole survivor, Kevin Spacey. Interrogated by police officer Chazz Palminteri, Spacey spins a bizarre tale of treachery and murder, over which hovers the specter of a mysterious master criminal named Keyser Soze. Bryan Singer's direction consists mainly of misdirection: Like a magician, he diverts attention from clues that might enable viewers to peer through veils of deception shrouding the truth. He's ably assisted by the powerhouse cast, the standout of which is clearly Spacey. His Oscar-winning portrayal of crippled stoolie, Roger "Verbal" Kint, catapulted the character actor to stardom. Distinguished by its deliciously clever script, razor-sharp direction, and superb, nuanced performances, The Usual Suspects is a modern classic. Ed Hulse
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