When Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro teamed for the first time in Heat the main complaint from fans was that there was not enough screen time for them together. In fact the one scene in that film that had them together was shoe horned into the film. It had to be because in that one the two were on opposite sides of the law.

No problem on that score here because in Righteous Kill, Pacino and DeNiro play a pair of veteran police detectives who take the job very seriously indeed. What they're working on now is as the leads in team that is tracking down a serial killer who likes to leave little poetical epitaphs behind for each victim.

The plot here is borrowed from Magnum Force, but in that film, Hal Holbrook has recruited a personal death squad from among the young officers of the San Francisco PD. and Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry is trying to solve the case. When these guys do figure it out that it's a cop doing the killing, it's one individual however doing it on their own.

This is not a harmonious team that Lieutenant Brian Dennehy has put together. Carla Gugino is trying to show she's as tough as the men and a couple of younger detectives, John Leguizamo and Donnie Wahlberg are wanting bad to show up the older Pacino and DeNiro.

Righteous Kill is pure gold when the two acting legends are on the screen together. When the attention is not on them however, the story does drag a bit in spots. In fact the very lack of forensic clues at the crime scenes should have alerted this team as to where to look for the killer.

Still no opportunity to see Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro for the price of one ticket should be missed.

I'd heard bad things about RIGHTEOUS KILL, but how could any cop thriller teaming up two of the best actors of all time be all that bad? By the time it showed up on terrestrial TV, I was all ready to give it a sympathetic viewing if only for the pleasure of watching two former heavyweights back on-screen together.

Sadly, what they said about RIGHTEOUS KILL turns out to be true: this is a piece of hokum, a badly-scripted and equally poorly-directed example of movie-making. It's so cheap and lacking in incident that the whole film seems to be taking place either in some dimly-lit warehouse or in a dimly-lit police station, and there's no style, no finesse or indeed energy injected into the proceedings at any point.

The whole plot hangs on to a lame twist that's so glaringly obvious that you wonder how it got past studio bosses - do they really think audiences are this dim? Pacino and De Niro do their best with what they've got, but they do seem faintly embarrassed, as if they can tell this is no good and they're in a hurry to get it done and dusted as quickly as they can. A handful of interesting supporting actors (including Brian Dennehy) fail to provide inspiration, leaving this a lifeless dud of a film.

Turk (Robert De Niro) and Rooster (Al Pacino) are aging police detective partners. They are after a smart drug dealer Spider (50 Cent). Also somebody is killing the criminal class. Other police detectives are played by Carla Gugino, John Leguizamo, Brian Dennehy, and Donnie Wahlberg.

While it's great to see such superior actors chew up the dialog, I wish that they had better material to use. There are flash forwards that are either annoyingly on the nose, or bad obvious redirection. Either way it is unnecessary. The movie is better off without the distraction.

The style has a bit of cheese, but mostly a TV police drama feel. It's not a strong suit. These actors deserve better. It just doesn't have any big cinematic visuals. The action isn't there, and there is no energy.

It's obvious what the movie is trying to do. While it isn't actually cheating, it does make me feel manipulated. It's like a magician who's too obvious with a trick. It leaves me feeling underwhelmed.