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Revenge gets served ice-cold in "Secret in Their Eyes," a brooding look at crime and punishment adapted from an Oscar-winning Argentine drama from 2009.
Ray Kasten (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is a former FBI agent obsessed with finding the guy he knows killed the daughter of his friend Los Angeles Police detective Jess Cobb (Julia Roberts) 13 years earlier, when Kasten and Cobb worked on a counterterrorism task force after the 9/11 attacks.
Kasten returns to L.A. to persuade District Attorney Claire Sloane (Nicole Kidman), who worked the case in 2002 as a newly arrived assistant D.A., to reopen the case. Claire is wary of reopening old wounds, for Jess' sake and because of the sparks Claire and Ray had back in the day.
Writer-director Billy Ray ("Breach," "Shattered Glass") transfers Juan José Campanella's original film neatly to modern L.A., finding in post-9/11 paranoia a fitting substitute for the Argentine version's Peronist backstory. Ejiofor, Kidman and especially Roberts give strong performances, pulsing with the propulsive force of obsession and sadness all three characters carry.
'Secret in Their Eyes'
Opening Friday, Nov. 20, in theaters everywhere; rated PG-13 for thematic material involving disturbing violent content, language and some sexual references; 111 minutes.