Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
 

True Believer (1988)

Director: Joseph Ruben

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

A riveting legal drama which casts James Woods as a jaded, ex-radical lawyer, once dubbed 'The bastard son of Mother Teresa' but now reduced to defending scumbag drug dealers. His '60s idealism rekindled by a new, wide-eyed assistant (Downey), he takes on the case of a young Korean serving '25 to life' for murdering a Chinatown gang leader. Things get nasty when the DA starts pressuring Woods to drop the case; but convinced of his client's innocence and determined to salvage his self-respect, he presses on with a desperate, almost evangelical zeal. Ruben's smart direction keeps one guessing throughout, with an investigation that takes in a paranoid Vietnam veteran, white racist vigilantes, a retired detective with a guilty secret, and plumbing supplies. A taut, intelligent and engrossing thriller, featuring yet another manic performance by Woods, the undisputed King of Misdirected Energy.

Author: NF

Time Out Film Guide

  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Joseph Ruben

Producer: Walter F Parkes, Lawrence Lasker

Cast: James Woods, Robert Downey Jr, Yuji Okumoto, Margaret Colin, Kurtwood Smith, Tom Bower, Charles Hallahan full cast

Genre(s): Thrillers

Duration: 103 mins


Features

Different Strokes

Different Strokes

Chris Smith dips his toe into new waters in The Pool.

Street fighting men

BAM celebrates John Carpenter’s sci-fi-inflected rage against the machine.

Zoom in:

<em>They Live'</em>s Roddy Piper

The American experience

British comedian Steve Coogan gets in touch with his inner Yank in <em>Hamlet 2.</em>

Spanish intuition

Scarlett Johansson and Rebecca Hall flirt away an Iberian summer in <em>Vicky Cristina Barcelona.</em>

Shadows and frogs

Crime pays in Film Forum’s expansive French noir series.

Strip tease

IFC’s new midnight-movie series revisits Hollywood’s groovy ’60s scene.

To air is human

<em>Man on Wire,</em> a new doc about a surreal Manhattan morning, aims high.