Romeo Is Bleeding

Jack Grimaldi (Oldman) is a New York cop on the take and then some. He sells out witnesses to the Mob and buries the pay-offs in his backyard. He's got a wife (Sciorra) and a girlfriend (Lewis). He's keeping it together, he thinks. Then he meets Mona Demarkov (Olin). A glamorous Russian gangster, she's in bed with the Feds and at the head of the Mafia's death list - but Jack just could be her trump card. Director Medak goes off the rails in high style with this dementedly doleful exercise in pop noir. But the film plays out the battle of the sexes at such an unflinchingly amoral pitch it really isn't funny anymore. Like Oldman's deluded operator - playing both ends and getting caught in the middle - Hilary Henkin's script isn't as smart as it thinks it is, and only Olin's breathtakingly excessive femme fatale hits the right note of campy panache.