Where's the Money, Noreen? Reviews

Isn't it a mistake to encapsulate your entire plot line into your title? You'll be wondering where the mystery is in this low-octane crime melodrama about a botched armored-car robbery that leaves participants dead, money missing, and the audience confused as to why they should care about either. Flashbacks rehash the tale of ex-con Noreen Rafferty (Julianne Phillips), who drove the getaway car for an armored car heist facilitated by her brother, Teddy (Simon Reynolds). The prospect of fast money is betrayed when gang leader Satterfield (Jeremy Ratchford) mows down the guards and "apparently" vanishes with the dough (actually Noreen has hidden the money), after Teddy is slain by a rookie cop. After paying her debt to society, Noreen can't relax due to the persistence of the original arresting officer, Briscoe (Nigel Bennett). Although Satterfield has been killed in prison, he blabbed info to his cellmate Harlan Dietz (Billy Otis), who begins threatening Noreen about the missing moolah. Determined to figure out the identity of the insider at the security firm who masterminded the robbery, Noreen can't decide whether the crime instigator who ruined her life is her solicitous bakery co-worker Gardella (A Martinez), an overly romantic customer named Kevin Hanover (Colm Feore), or the late father of an insurance claims clerk, Gene Kajikawa (Paul Lee), who works for the firm that originally investigated this case. While Gene cooperates with Noreen to clear his dad of suspicion and make a name for himself, Noreen is menaced by Dietz who gets tossed off a roof by Gardella. Tipped off by her ongoing research that Hanover is the inside man responsible for her brother's death, Noreen confronts Hanover at one of his salvage-operation sites, and pushes him to his death. Learning that Gardella is an undercover cop, and satisfied that the man responsible for leading her brother astray has been punished, Noreen retrieves the money that she stashed in a church. Giving some of her ill-gotten gain to a homeless family that befriended her, patient Noreen, who has outwitted authorities and crooks alike, begins a new life with the coveted blood money. If only one gasped with surprise when innocent-looking Noreen lays her mitts on the filthy lucre! Instead, one's response is: doesn't the church pay anyone to dust its alcoves? Aside from the 12-1/2 years of plot dust settled on Noreen's quest, the viewer has little of interest to ponder; the suspense ploys are transparent, and there are enough flashbacks for these sequences to secede from the proceedings and form a separate movie. Foolishly, the lazy screenwriter feels that merely by zeroing in on Noreen's justice-search for the inside man, we won't harbor suspicions about her hidden agenda. As the bored viewer seeks solace in repeating the film's title (each time emphasizing a different word: Where's the Money, Noreen? Where's the Money, Noreen? Where's the Money, Noreen?), the spectator chants a mantra of viewer dissatisfaction. As the lame subterfuges aimed at pressuring Noreen to divulge the location of the money pass by indifferently, the audience doesn't care where Noreen stashed that booty. What they want to know is "Where's the Excitement, Noreen?" It isn't to be found in a tiny suspect pool, rotting red herrings, or underestimating the ability of armchair detectives to spot this movie's surprises a mile away. (Violence, profanity, adult situations.)