Customer Reviews

Cleaner

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

CLEANER is somewhat of an enigmatic movie: it starts out as though it is going to be a sassy comedy about a retired cop whose job it is to 'clean up' after homicides (a distinctly messy and repulsive job), turns into a rather grisly crime investigation story, adds a dollop of 'ain't life grand', and finishes as an exposé of police corruption. The story line by Matthew Aldrich is further fragmented by being so full of holes that the audience has to toss credibility overboard in order to make it through, and the method of direction by Renny Harlin can't seem to settle on which style to take. It is all kind of a mess and justifies the straight to DVD move. The saving grace of the film is a cast of stalwart actors who can make even a shaky script palatable.

Tom Cutler (Samuel L. Jackson) is a 'retired' cop who makes his living cleaning up the gory remainders of criminal acts of homicide and other grisly crimes. We learn his wife was murdered some years ago, leaving him as a single father of the bright and charming teenager Rose (Keke Palmer). Cutler happens on an assignment to clean a particularly gruesome homicide scene in the home of one Ann Northcut (Eva Mendes in a nicely understated role) and as the convoluted story develops, Cutler realizes that the crime scene represents a culmination of forces that threaten to uncork a long history of police corruption - a history that involves him and his best friend Eddie Lorenzo (Ed Harris) and the tough Detective Jim Vargas (a terrific Luis Guzmán). How the story ties together and ends is too loose to convey and would ruin the minimal drama present.

Each of the actors, even the minor roles played very well by such artists as Jose Pablo Cantillo and Robert Forster, give it the full court press. But the see-through script and the jumbled camera work and direction prevent this from being a significant film. Grady Harp, June 08

Jackson is a former cop who apparently resigned from the force for reasons related to the general standard of morality there (I lost my stomach for it, he says), and started a business that cleans up the most unspeakable mess, often crime scenes, but also pet infestations and other stuff. The movie starts badly, like a black comedy that is not funny.
Then it turns into an interesting story. We learn that Jackson's character is a widower with a teenage daughter. The wife got killed by a burgler and then the burgler got killed by somebody while in prison. His best pal in the force was Ed Harris, who was somehow involved in everything. Jackson doesn't handle his single parenthood too well.
One day he gets a job order, seemingly from the police, to clean up a murder scene. He does, and then finds out he was trapped: he has helped hide an actual murder case and now is on the police's suspect list.
Mendes is the not-yet-confirmed widow. We think the police are the bad guys, with a big case of an IA investigation causing panic all over.
I will not tell here what happens next, though it is so unlikely that it makes me withdraw a star for incredibility.
I drop one more star because the centre of the plot doesn't hold water. If one could accept the trap in a technical sense, it would be a good idea, but with some CSI training one spots the holes in the trap with eyes wide shut.

The premise of Cleaner centers around an ex police officer, Tom Carver [ Samuel L Jackson] who quit the profession due to some messy business having to do with a criminal dying in prison under suspicious circumstances. Tom is a widowed, single dad to a teenage daughter Rose [Keke Palmer] who is intelligent and spirited. Tom finds it harder each day to deal with his daughter's questions regarding her deceased mom and the circumstances surrounding her death. His job as a 'cleaner of crime scenes' seems to go along well until a fateful day when he gets called in to clean-up a homicide scene and finds that he was set-up - the crime he cleans up after was never reported to the police, and he in fact inadvertently acted as an accessory to cover it up. Soon, Tom finds himself the prime suspect in the case- and there are a bunch of crooked cops after him.

He turns in desperation to his ex-partner, Eddie Lorenzo [Ed Harris in a wasted role] who seems helpful enough yet resentful of Tom's cutting him out of Tom's and Rose's [Eddie is Rose's godfather] lives. Then there is Mrs Norcut [Eva Mendes in a subtle yet effective performance] whose house was the one Tom 'cleaned' and whose husband is missing. Is Mr Norcut the victim of foul play and if so, who is the party responsible? Things get messy and confusing and Tom finds himself being besieged by all sides, whilst he tries to figure everything out.

The movie certainly has an interesting idea yet suffers from poor execution. It is only saved by the performances of a good cast - from Samuel L Jackson's Tom Carver, to Eva Mendes's Mrs Norcut, and even credible acting by those performing in the minor roles such as Rose [Keke Palmer], Det Vargas [Luis Guzman] and Tom's assistant. Ed Harris offers a lacklustre performance here - and his role is wasted. Also, the movie suffers from an incredulous plotline halfway through, and we can see some of the twists from miles away.

It's not a bad movie, just lacking some spiciness. Final verdict: an average crime thriller.

Another great performance by Samuel L. Jackson and if it wasn't for him, my rating would have been quite lower. He really outshines all the rest of the cast. In my opinion, even Ed Harris doesn't give his full devotion. The storyline gets slow at times, but it gets a star for its originality and a few nice twists at the beginning and towards the end. Not an extraordinary movie, but certainly worth the viewing!

This film is somewhat different than the run of the mill police crime stories. It introduces viewers to an unusual profession. Its principal character is a retired cop who is compulsive about cleanliness and order. He starts a company to clean and sanitize houses where people died, including houses overrun with blood, where there has been a murder. He left the police department because he disliked the corruption that was taking place in it, a corruption in which he was apparently involved in a minor way. His wife was murdered just before his retirement and he sought revenge against the murderer. His daughter was profoundly affected by the murder and he tries to help her cope.

His office receives a call to clean a house where he is told a murder was committed, and he cleans the house. But he discovers that the police officer who ostensibly made the telephone call hiring him does not exist and the police know nothing about a murder of the man, in the house or anywhere. They only know that the man is missing. It seems that he, the ex cop, was hired to hide a murder. The movie explores who hired him, why the man was murdered, who did the murder, was he set up to be tried for the murder, is corruption in the police department behind the murder, and who can he trust.

Single father and former cop Tom Carver has an unusual job, he cleans up crime scenes. But when he's called in to sterilize a wealthy suburban residence after a brutal shooting, Carver is shocked to learn he may have unknowingly erased crucial evidence, entangling himself in a dirty criminal cover up. Samuel L. Jackson and Ed Harris did their job very well in the leading roles and Harlin's direction was also good. "Cleaner" is a dark, gritty crime thriller that just needed that original surprise twist in the end that never came, but it's worth a rent.

Certainly "Cleaner" looks interesting on paper; A-list actors including Samuel L. Jackson and Ed Harris and the film's story involves a job "crime scene cleaner." But if you are looking for something original, this is not the place. Renny Harlin's follow-up to critically-panned "The Covenant" is a lackluster crime thriller with a weak storyline, but at least there is one interesting thing it has.

Samuel L. Jackson plays Tom Cutler, a former police detective who runs a small cleaning company specializing in cleaning the crime scenes. After cleaning up the bloodstained room of an expensive home (alone, a dead body apparently removed), he realizes that no one, including the police and Ann (Eva Mendes) the wife living in the mansion, ever heard of the "crime scene" for which Tom was hired.

You know there are stories of "murder without a body"; the premise of "Cleaner" is more elaborated and ambitious, but after the mildly interesting introduction the film just goes downhill, having nothing original to offer. Besides its uninteresting story, some of the supporting characters are poorly-written, especially Eva Mendes's terribly bland Ann, who should be much more mysterious.

Back in 90s, Renny Harlin is mostly known for his Hollywood-made over-the-top action films like "The Long Kiss Goodnight" (with Samuel L. Jackson), "Cliffhanger," and "Die Hard 2." But I believe he really wants to be known for something else. In "Cleaner" he spends considerable time depicting the relations between Tom Cutler and his daughter Rose (Keke Palmer) who wants to know more about her dead mother in spite of her father's obvious unwillingness.

Also, our hero's everyday habits such as his almost ritualistic way of working are repeatedly shown. There are snappy editing and smart camerawork (showing the careful way he locks the door every night, for instance) that suggests his desires to get away from the world outside and protect his beloved daughter. The script also tries not to make Cutler's character too good or heroic, which I think is a good thing.

Despite all these efforts, however, the cliché-ridden story is too weak to hold our attention. "Cleaner" doesn't offer much beyond the familiar crime-thriller elements with a convoluted story and incredible climax where mystery, if any, will evaporate quickly, not in the most intriguing way. By the time you reach there, I think you will have lost your interest, not even in the profession of crime scene cleaner itself, which deserves a better treatment.

There's nothing great about this film, but there's nothing really bad either. It's an okay rental that is quickly forgotten.

The plot is laid out clearly enough with Amazon's synopsis, so I'll dispense with that here. In this film we have some top actors giving good performances. Samuel L. Jackson is more subtle than usual and that's a welcome change. There isn't a film that Ed Harris hasn't been that I haven't enjoyed to some degree and gives another nice performance here. Eva Mendes shows a bit more acting depth here than in most of her films, but then again, who cares? She's simply stunning and a pleasure to see.

The film runs like a better than usual CSI TV episode and that should help this film. If I had paid good money to see it in theater, I would have been mildly annoyed, but as a rental on the small screen, the film is enjoyable enough. It's a bit contrived, even ludicrous in places, but it all comes together in the end and makes for a satisfying 90 minutes.

The Cleaner looked intriguing - this film noir meets thriller piece with Samuel Jackson as the ex-cop cleaner turned gumshoe is exquisitely shot and grabbed me from the first frame. The novelty of the film which is never fully capitalized is its CSI turned inside out treatment. Where CSI's characters just nail their cases - this world is filled with morally ambiguous people that are troubled by their decisions.

As the film unfolded, I was surprised to learn that it was helmed by Renny Harlin (admittedly not one of my favourite directors) who, unlike his Die Hard days, exercises some artistic restraint in his treatment. The cinematography and crisp images captivate you as you almost recall Angel Heart and Mickey Rourke losing his mind - but then the film descends into a beat-by-beat whodunit rather than a psychological thriller. Instead of feeling in danger as we should, we become less intrigued as Renny connects the dots.

Cleaner starts magnificently but like so many Hollywood films, never escalates the potential and emotions of the characters or the plot. There's a layer missing here, making Cleaner one of those could-have-beens. Samuel Jackson remains peerless and the real reason to watch this. The overall cast is pretty good, but Renny, if you're going to do Noir, make it darker!

PS - Samuel's relationship with Keke Palmer - his screen daughter in the film is great and worth watching...

The Cleaner, like some other Samuel Jackson movies, comes packed with his powerful depiction, this time of an ex-police office (seems like picking up where the "The Negotiator" left off).

The premise is really nice, though not surprising. The moment I found out what job Jackson does, it was easy to guess how the plot could go. There are some dead give-aways, but then you probably already know that. In which case, you might also know that the movie does have some really enjoyable plot twists, and tight screenplay. The plot is simple (I could guess the whodunit aspect quite early in the movie - though not the motive!), but the performance of two great actors - Jackson and Harris make the movie a treat to watch.

I especially liked the background score of the movie, as IMO, it accentuated the mood of some of the shots depicting the Cleaner at work, as well as when he realizes he has a lot at stake to risk loosing it all.

What's missing (?), you might ask. Well, for starters, a plot that in addition to being so taught and well scripted, an actual original idea for a murder mystery would have been nice. Secondly, I concede that Jackson is capable of a lot more than what the movie has extracted out of him as an actor. He has done a wonderful job, but there are spots in the storyline where one could have imagined his character behave differently. I like him not just for his acting but also his dialogue (delivery), and I was left wanting more in that department. But then, that's just my opinion.

All in all, I would give this movie a 3.5 out of 5.
Definitely above average, and probably worth an Academy nomination.