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Angel Eyes
by Derek Neff

Despite the deliberately misleading ad campaign promoting Luis Mandoki’s Angel Eyes as a crime thriller with possible supernatural overtones, Angel Eyes doesn’t really fall into this category. It is, instead, a straight-forward, old-fashioned love story about the meeting of two damaged urban souls.

Police officer Sharon Pogue (Jennifer Lopez) is saved from certain death by a mysterious passing stranger who goes only by the name of Catch (played by Jim Caviezel). The two meet for coffee later, and wind up in Sharon’s unkempt apartment kissing passionately, although Catch breaks things off and abruptly leaves before things can go much further. The two are shell-shocked and jaded — he by a tragedy in his past that we only gradually learn more about as the movie goes on, she by memories of a father who routinely beat her mother — and fearful of the love that is growing between them.

This is a Hollywood movie, so things glide along a lot less messily than they would in real life, although Lopez delivers a convincing performance as a cop who hides behind a forced bravado. As with her powerful role in Out of Sight, Lopez manages to convey great strength and great vulnerability at the same time. Despite her highly dubious career as a pop musician, and as a provocative wearer of skimpy clothes at award ceremonies, Lopez is a great talent, and she is never more winning and beautiful than she is here, when she takes off the glitzy make-up and acts like a real person.

There is nothing particularly great about Angel Eyes — its problems are too typical, and its solutions too easy — but the story moves along smoothly enough, and I was intrigued by the characters enough to enjoy the experience while it was happening. Angel Eyes is actually something that you would never have guessed from the ads: a good date movie.