I only watched this movie because there was nothing else even remotely interesting and Lance Reddick is so good on The Wire. Reddick is a dirty cop but we’re supposed to think that’s only due to some bad luck and too much gambling, which got him under the thumb of Julian, a weird local crime boss played by Austin Pembleton.

Dirty Work picks up when Assistant State Attorney Frank Sullivan (Mike McGlore), running for his boss’s job, comes home late one night. During a fight he gets physical with his alcoholic wife and strangles her; he and his campaign manager smuggle the body out and stage her to appear as if she was another victim of a rapist/murderer. The other plot is that Reddick decides he’s not going to let Julian ruin a young Polish hotel maid, after she overheard the real killer, Julian’s top goon, admit that fact to his boss.

In the end, this movie is too simple and formulaic. Writer/director Bruce Terris, in his first feature-length production, leans too heavily on dark visuals, bad Chicago winter weather and some pretty decent acting to overcome poor material with too few surprises for a thriller.

not recommended