Desperate Housewives’ shirtless pool-boy Jesse Metcalfe stars as C. J., a cheesy TV host trying to be taken seriously as a reporter in this remake of a 1956 Fritz Lang noir. C. J. frames himself for murder in an attempt to expose the evidence-tampering of the DA (an under-used but welcome Michael Douglas), with one eye on justice and another on a Pulitzer.
Evidently, no-one told him Pulitzer Prizes aren’t actually handed out to TV reporters, but that’s the least of his problems as the plot’s twists and turns leave holes big enough to throw a gavel through. The biggest crime, however, is that Metcalfe’s limitations help the cool ’50s stylings end up like an ’80s TV movie.