BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Jonah Abbott There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

loveablejohn-26233 This movie was excellent overall with the actors playing their roles well especially Mickey Rourke and Lisa Bonet who both did an outstanding job in their roles. The script was well written and the cinematography was excellent with location shooting in both New York and New Orleans which is why I gave it 10 stars. Also the dvd that I watched had two commentaries one by the director and another by Mickey Rourke which were excellent along with a documentary about voodoo and interviews with the cast and the director along with a photo gallery.

Predrag This is an intriguing, unusual, beautifully directed, highly atmospheric film that successfully crosses any number of genre: film noir, thriller, mystery, and horror. The plot is simple. In the mid nineteen fifties, a mysterious and slightly sinister business man, Louis Cypher (Robert De Niro), hires Brooklyn gumshoe, Harry Angel (Mickey Rourke), for a missing person case. Angel's investigation, for which he is being paid a princely sum for the time, takes him from Harlem to New Orleans, as he looks for a former crooner named Johnny Favorite, who sometime during the early nineteen forties apparently welched on a business deal with Louis Cypher and hasn't been heard from since.In my opinion this is very much a film which you will be able to enjoy on repeated viewings, to savour the art of the cinematographer as well as to get a better understanding of the complexity of the plot. Yes, there are several murders and quite a lot of blood but I think you will be doing yourself a disservice if you choose not to buy for that reason. To a great extent the violence is retrospective and not in the same stomach wrenching category of 'Saving Private Ryan'.Robert De Niro is sensational in the highly stylized, role of Louis Cypher. He imbues the role with just the right amount of sardonic humor and restrained menace so as to make the character memorable. De Niro leaves an indelible imprint on every scene in which he is in. Mickey Rourke, who is in nearly every scene in this film, shows that he has the ability to carry a movie, as he is simply terrific as the private detective who is slowly unraveling. As the film progresses, the toll that the investigation is taking on the tormented Angel is evident on his face. Angst ridden, bleary eyed, and disheveled, Angel is definitely involved in the biggest case of his life. As he gets closer to the truth of what happened to Johnny Favorite, the more his life seems to be spinning out of control. Rourke manages to convey all this, no easy task. The supporting cast is uniformly excellent and adds to the flavor of this delicious gumbo of a film, which is reminiscent of Goethe's Faust. Overall rating: 9 out of 10.

redhotmustafa-1 The cinematography, the pictures, the sites, the atmosphere - very good. The story - good enough to make something memorable out of it. But...The acting and directing is so poor. Mickey Rourke is such a "nothing". He is maybe handsome but you don't buy it in the movie. Cool ? Clever ? Emotional ? No, just nothing, no depth, no character, just a bum walking around. And that is the last thing such a story should do.The directing - every time there is action I asked myself "why are they running around ?" You just don't buy it, like the whole story in total. And everything looks so unconnected. No depth creation for the main character is the most serious lack of the movie.Can't keep wondering what David Fincher could have made out of it.

Leofwine_draca As dark and brooding a slice of American Gothic as you could wish for, ANGEL HEART is one of the best straight horror outings to come out of the late '80s – a time when most genre offerings were cheesy, rubbery outings of stupidity. ANGEL HEART is in essence a mood piece. Set during the 1950s, it chronicles the efforts of a private detective to track down a missing person who soon finds himself in some very dark places. With a string of unpleasant sex and violence scenes, excellent direction from the always-good Alan Parker and some quite wonderful performances, this is a real classic. There aren't that many films that deal with modern-day voodoo in a non-biased way so this one's a real treat.Parker is adept at crafting atmosphere and you can almost smell the cigarette smoke in this seedy, grubby little film. Mickey Rourke, in a career-best performance, is Harry Angel, the protagonist. Angel is a pretty unpleasant guy who thinks nothing of using violence as a method and yet Rourke embodies him with a raw humanity that makes us warm to him from the start. Although he's the archetypal tough guy he projects an air of bruised vulnerability that makes him riveting to see on screen. He has some great supporting actors with him, too; Lisa Bonet excels in a layered performance as the voodoo-practising Epiphany Proudfoot; Charlotte Rampling as a fortune teller; finally Robert De Niro, as great as ever as the sinister Louis Cyphre.The film is pretty slowly paced but laced with moments of action and violence that breathe life into it. My attention never wavered for a second. There are occasional missteps – I could have done without the 'glowing eye' stuff that takes place at the climax, that only serves to cheapen the effect; good when used in films like FRIGHT NIGHT, but not here! But the handling of Rourke's gradual realisation as he pieces together the mystery and his final understanding of the true horror of his situation is top notch and the film then ends on an unforgettable piece of imagery. Altogether a great work and a film I thoroughly enjoyed.