The Movie

RIGHTEOUS KILL

Release: September 12, 2008
Directed by: Jon Avnet
Screenplay by: Russell Gewirtz           
Produced by: Rob Cowan, Avi Lerner, Randall Emmett, Jon Avnet, Lati Grobman, Alexandra Milchan, Daniel M. Rosenberg
Co-Produced by: Marsha Oglesby
Executive Produced by: George Furla, Boaz Davidson, Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short
Cast: Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Curtis Jackson, Carla Gugino, Donnie Wahlberg, Trilby Glover, Brian Dennehy, John Leguizamo

Academy Award® winners Robert De Niro (Raging Bull)and Al Pacino (Scent of a Woman) star as a pair of veteran New York City police detectives on the trail of a vigilante serial killer in the adrenaline fueled psychological thriller Righteous Kill, directed by Jon Avnet (Red Corner, Fried Green Tomatoes) and written by Russell Gewirtz (Inside Man). The cast also features hip-hop superstar Curtis Jackson (Get Rich or Die Tryin’).

After 30 years as partners in the pressure cooker environment of the NYPD, highly decorated Detectives David Fisk and Thomas Cowan should be ready for retirement, but aren’t.  Before they can hang up their badges, they are called in to investigate the murder of a notorious pimp, which appears to have ties to a case they solved years before.

Like the original murder, the victim is a suspected criminal whose body is found accompanied by a four line poem justifying the killing. When additional crimes take place, it becomes clear the detectives are looking for a serial killer, one who targets criminals that have fallen through the cracks of the judicial system. His mission is to do what the cops can’t do on their own—take the culprits off the streets for good. The similarities between the recent killings and their earlier case raise a nagging question: Did they put the wrong man behind bars?