Jennifer Lopez's best role to date was as the shotgun-wielding FBI agent in "Out of Sight". Unfortunately her return to law enforcement in "Angel Eyes" proves to be something of a bland bust. While she tones down the glamour to portray a no-nonsense Chicago beat cop, Lopez fails to bring her usual vitality to a moribund melodrama which starts intriguingly before becoming utterly banal.
Opening on the aftermath of a fatal car crash, "Angel Eyes" jumps forward 12 months to introduce Catch (James Caviezel), a taciturn loner who drifts around the Windy City performing unmotivated acts of kindness. For some reason he latches onto female cop Sharon Pogue (Lopez), shadowing her every move and eventually saving her life when she falls foul of a gun-toting thug.
Sharon, whose tough exterior hides a sensitive soul still smarting from a painful rift with her father (Victor Argo), is drawn to her rescuer, despite the fact that he refuses to reveal anything about himself. But who exactly is Catch? And what connects him to the film’s opening car crash?
With its echoes of "The Sixth Sense" and "City of Angels", Luis Mandoki's picture seems to be heading in a vaguely supernatural direction, with Catch's beatific generosity and spooky omnipresence suggesting he may literally be Lopez's guardian angel. The reality, however, is rather more pedestrian, leaving the audience feeling short-changed, cheated and not a little bored.
"Angel Eyes" is released in UK cinemas on Friday 31st August 2001.