Secret In Their Eyes (2015) * 1/2

Directed by:  Billy Ray

Starring:  Chiwetel Ejifor, Nicole Kidman, Julia Roberts, Alfred Molina, Dean Norris, Michael Kelly,
Zoe Graham, Joe Cole

While watching Secret In Their Eyes, I thought of the line in Funny Farm in which Chevy Chase's wife says about his book, "There are all these flashbacks.   Flash forwards.    I think there was even a flash sideways."    Secret In Their Eyes begins in the present day with plenty of visits to the past trying to sustain a story so thin it is miraculous 105 minutes can be fleshed from it.     The movie spends even more time on a character and relationship that really isn't necessary.    Can anyone who has seen this movie know what purpose Nicole Kidman's character serves?   

The film is a Hollywood remake of the 2010 Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Language Film "The Secret In Their Eyes".    This version of Secret In Their Eyes is a plodding police procedural in which no one seems to be having a good time.     The film feels tired and defeated even before it arrives at the silly twist ending.    Actually, there is the twist ending and then another twist ending which reverses the first twist.     What is even more bizarre is the main character's complete nonchalance to it.    This would be a perfect time to channel Adam Sandler in The Wedding Singer and say, "These are things that should have been brought to my attention YESTERDAY."   

The events begin in 2002 Los Angeles.    9/11 changed the world months earlier and Los Angeles is seen as the next potential terrorist target.    FBI agents Ray Kasten (Ejiofor) and Jessica Cobb (Roberts) having a local mosque under surveillance because it has Muslim attendees, I suppose.    Soon, a body is found in a dumpster next to the mosque revealed to be Jessica's daughter (Graham).   She was raped and murdered.    Ray conducts his own unofficial investigation since the matter is under city jurisdiction.     All roads lead to a slimy creep named Marzin.   The trouble is Marzin is a protected snitch providing information about the mosque.     District Attorney Martin Morales (Molina) drags his feet on prosecuting Marzin because national security takes higher priority to him than a murder.     With priorities so fouled up, it is not surprising to learn Morales is long gone as DA when the film moves to the present day. 

I mentioned Nicole Kidman in the first paragraph.    In 2002, she plays assistant DA Claire Sloane, whom Ray has a crush on.     Their relationship is non-existent until suddenly it is existent.    Their initial scenes revolve around Ray's unrequited love for her and without any explanation they are suddenly holding hands and declaring their love for each other.     Did the scenes establishing the furthering of their relationship wind up on the editing room floor?    The movie flashes to present day as well, where the now-retired Ray returns to Los Angeles to inform Jessica and Claire that he has located Marzin, who disappeared after the murders and is supposedly living under a presumed name right in L.A.    Are we to believe that a murder suspect would return to the scene of the crime years later under an assumed name and identity?    Really?

Kidman, who is still a great beauty of course, serves no real purpose to the plot except to be gazed upon by Ray.    If her character were cut out of the movie, the only casualty would be the running time.    She seems more like a third wheel.    For some reason, Julia Roberts is asked to play Jessica without makeup and looking sad and sickly all of the time.    We want to send her to a tanning salon and grief counselor in that order.    Ejiofor was so powerful in 12 Years a Slave and muted here.    There is no juice there, even in scenes where he has to stare at Kidman like a schoolboy with a mad crush.   

Secret In Their Eyes moves along slowly between two time frames with our full knowledge that there has to be a Big Reveal somewhere and all of this stuff will be rendered meaningless anyway.    The movie is unnecessarily solemn as it creeps along to an ending that defies logic and sanity.    Billy Ray takes this film so seriously that there is little room for any sort of enjoyment from the actors.    They dial down so much they seem to be taking Billy Wilder's advice to Jack Lemmon on acting to heart.   If you don't know the story, Wilder kept reshooting the same take over and over again, asking Lemmon to emote less and less with each take.    Lemmon finally responded, "If I give you any less, I won't give you anything,"   Wilder replied enthusiastically, "YES!"