It was okay, but it could have been better.

So it's a modern film-noir. Which is nice, because classic film-noirs are boring as fuck, so this one was way more palatable to modern audiences. The cast is very interesting, we've got Edward Norton, Bruce Willis, Alec Baldwin, Michael Kenneth Williams and Willem Dafoe. They all play somewhat decent characters, none of them are overplayed, though a few I would say are underplayed, given their fame. That said, the plot is too convoluted and messy. And while I paid enough attention to get what was going on, I'm still not convinced it made a lot of sense. I think the movie casts its nets too wide. It's a period drama, and detective film, tackles racism, rape, inequality, rich people being assholes, politicians being corrupt, orphandry, mental issues, journalism integrity, romance... I don't know. I think it's too ambitious and in the end all of those things sort of feel like they were not as well made as they could have been. And in the end, I'm not sure much is accomplished. That said, the aura of the movie is a good one, I think, it's got decent humor, it's not too unbearably dramatic like it could have been based on its many themes. So, it's not a good movie, but it's not a bad one either. It's sort of a nice inbetweener that ain't worth much but it's still nice to look at.