Lots of huff and puff but little suspense in this star-lined retro-conspiracy with intrepid celebrity reporter (Lohman) delving into the cold case of the death of a hotel maid (Blanchard) whose body was discovered in a freezer accompanying celebrity duo Lanny (Bacon) and Vince (Firth). There's one scene that will more than likely make you gasp, plenty of bare butts, exposed racks and simulated sexual encounters as Bacon and Firth engage in a multitude of debaucheries that eventually lead to their professional demise.Hayman plays the type of role in which a Pete Postlethwaite would have excelled, his character omnipresent, but never quite able to shine in the shadow of mega-egos like Firth and Bacon both vying for most decadent leading man honours (I'm going to go with Firth's performance for reasons that will become obvious if you watch the film). Blanchard is the body beautiful but with few other attributes on display, she transforms from meek maid into vivacious vixen and then expert extortionist with little provocation (which might be a script weakness). Lohman looked more suited to the Nickelodeon age group than that of the sage, wise owl reporter she was attempting to play.It's an odd movie, highly detailed and stylised but ultimately lacking a strong narrative structure, promising more than it delivers.

Here's the 30-second pitch: Egoyan tries to do David Lynch doing Raymond Chandler, falls flat on face. Bacon and Firth are excellent, Lohman is terrible, the worst miscasting I've seen for decades. The plot is incomprehensible not because of complexity but rotten editing. The sex is good, and the lobsters deliver.With a better screenplay it could have been a great film in the class of LA Confidential, The Big Sleep or Mulholland Drive - that it fails so comprehensively must cast doubt on Egoyan's ability as a director, since the cast (apart from Alison Lohman) deliver really good performances, and it looks fabulous throughout. It feels to me as if Egoyan's avant-garde past prevented him from engaging with the requirements of a whodunnit plot. I was so confused that I had to look up the plot on my smartphone even while watching the movie, something that I've never, ever done before. That's how much I wanted to like it.

The story opens in 1957, when Lenny Morris (Kevin Bacon) and Vince Collins (Colin Firth), a famous Martin and Lewis-type act, are hosting a telethon. That night, a dead woman is found in their hotel room and the team breaks up under a cloud of suspicion. Fifteen years later, a young journalist (Alison Lohman) wants to interview Collins for a book and begins to probe the mysterious death.Bacon and Firth are both fine actors, but they are wasted in this terrible film. Alison Lohman is the main character and she's completely wrong for the part of a savvy young writer; she acts like a high school girl and looks so much like Amy Adams I was distracted and wishing Adams had done the part. She is timid and childish in all of her scenes and just isn't strong enough to carry the film. Firth tries to play against his charmer-image as a pill-popper, but I didn't believe him for a minute; he seems to be sleepwalking through the movie. Bacon is good as his slimy, heartless partner, but his character is so odious I cringed whenever he was on the screen.The director apparently thought this was a seductive, sophisticated mystery and used lots of moody film-noir music to try to heighten the drama, but nothing works. The story uses confusing flashbacks every few minutes and I never knew what was going on until the end and then I didn't care. A surprisingly bad and unpleasant movie with unnecessarily graphic sexuality.

That was truly awful.There was so much wrong with this movie that I just don't know where to begin. The plot is totally predictable and as far away from being believable it can get. Watching Alison Lohman in this movie was painful - the way she looks and speaks, you just can't make yourself believe that anyone of the other characters should take her character seriously. I just kept wondering why Colin Firth and Kevin Bacon agreed to take part in this nightmare. And then again, why of why was Alison Lohman picked to play this role?!? As awful as she is, she shouldn't get the whole credit for ruining this effort. The whole story is something like an unhealthy mix of Miss Marple stories and a bit of drugs, alcohol and soft-porn action, full of clichés and easy answers.