"The Little Things" less of a standard-issue policier than an absorbing study in guilt and obsession

The Little Things (2021)

Sometimes, a serial killer thriller just soothes the soul. That might sound sick, but “The Little Things” invokes the familiar, like every crime thriller of the 1990s elevated by a stellar cast. The unconventional, not-so-little thing about writer-director John Lee Hancock’s 1990-set film is how moral complexity ends up being the payoff. In fact, “The Little Things” only begins as a standard-issue police procedural, being more about guilt and obsession than seeing the legwork pay off and solving the whodunit. There’s nothing shockingly original about that idea, but when it’s done solidly as it is in “The Little Things,” seeing things to the end is like reading a page-turner. 

Fitting the usually unflappable Denzel Washington like a forensics glove, Joe Deacon is a former hotshot homicide detective still recovering from an unsolved murder case. Five years later now working as a deputy sheriff in Central California’s Kern County, Deacon gets sent to Los Angeles to pick up evidence on a case. Though he’s left that profession behind after a broken marriage and a heart attack for a quiet life in the country, the errand gets him caught right back up in a murder case with his replacement of sorts, confident up-and-comer Jim Baxter (Rami Malek). Four L.A. women have been killed, and Jim has no leads. When these murders increasingly trigger more memories of a past case, Deacon goes investigating on his own, following clues that land him on a prime suspect: crime-obsessed weirdo Albert Sparma (Jared Leto). Deacon might have to get Jim on board, looking for any circumstantial evidence to pin the murders on their guy, but Sparma turns out to be a bit savvier than the police realize. 

Titled after Deacon’s advice of looking for the small details that can get a perpetrator caught, “The Little Things” doles out information slowly but surely like a trail of breadcrumbs, some of which may or may not pay off. Though the trappings of a “True Detective” episode are all here, what writer-director John Lee Hancock (2016’s “The Founder”) aims to do instead is place the viewer into the tortured headspace of a detective who won't find peace of mind until avenging the victims of a murder case. There’s taking the work home with them and the obsession over parallels of former cases. There’s also the desire to have closure in a case where there might be none. If the picture more closely recalls Sean Penn's "The Pledge" and David Fincher’s “Zodiac” than Jonathan Demme's “The Silence of the Lambs” or Fincher's “Se7en,” it’s still not up to the level of any of those films.

Denzel Washington is one of those evergreen talents whom we tend to take for granted, but he is terrific here as the disgraced Deacon. It’s overall gravitas and the little nuances in Washington’s work, like the tensing of his lip or a small grin dying to get out, that make us feel the inner torment and psychological toll of seeking justice (or not). Religion courses through the story—Deacon talks about going to church, and there are several shots of him driving and staring at the Hollywood Cross—because faith in something higher than him is all Deacon really has left. All seemed lost when a moment of fallibility in his career broke him and now Deacon carries with him a heavy amount of baggage. As played by the intensely striking Rami Malek, Jim Baxter is much harder to read. Initially, it’s a twitchy, often mildly eccentric performance, as if he was directed to act suspiciously as a red herring. By the time Jim shares the same grim determination that Deacon faces, Malek settles more comfortably into the part and remains watchable throughout. 

And then there’s the chameleonic Jared Leto, who's never made a choice and not committed to it fully. Transforming himself with a distinct gait, sunken eyes, a paunch and greasy, stringy hair, Leto is an unpredictable, potentially unhinged presence as Albert Sparma, a wily crime buff who likes to taunt his interrogators. He not only reeks of creepiness, particularly when a flashlight is up in his face, but brings a jokey sense of humor that tests Deacon and Jim and has us hanging on every last drop of his magnetic oiliness. Supporting players, including Michael Hyatt as coroner Flo, an old friend of Deacon’s who loves '50s love songs, and Sofia Vassilieva, as Tina who’s being stalked in the opening moments, make strong impressions with limited screen time. Even Lee Garlington as a landlady with a sense of humor has one standout scene, while Natalie Morales, as Jim’s partner Jamie, is woefully underutilized as Jim’s partner Jamie, who remains wordless for her first few scenes.

A workmanlike director like John Lee Hancock still exhibits restraint in the nocturnal menace that hovers over the film without ever actually showing anyone strike. He knows how to craft genuine tension, paying homage to Buffalo Bill's stalking of Catherine Martin in a terrifying and effectively staged opening sequence with a young woman (Sofia Vassilieva) singing along to The B-52s before being terrorized by an aggressive motorist, to a tense car standoff between Deacon and Sparma. Thomas Newman's ominous score of electronic beats and John Schwartzman's moody noir lensing contribute to the dread; in a welcome bit to leaven the suspense, there's even a cheekily on-the-nose use of Peggy March’s “I Will Follow Him” as Deacon and Jim, well, follow their suspect. Setting the film in 1990 is perfectly fine, but aside from the lack of cell phones, there’s no major specificity or texture to the 1990s period being captured here. It is fun, however, to quickly spot billboards for both “Goodfellas” and “The Bonfire of the Vanities.” The last few minutes of the picture are bound to dissatisfy or even anger viewers whose preferences are tidy resolutions, but in terms of the story being told, it makes thematic sense. Despite a few questionable narrative choices, “The Little Things” is absorbing and uncommonly thoughtful, ending exactly where it should: salvation or something close enough to it. 

Grade: B

Warner Bros. Pictures is releasing “The Little Things” (127 min.) in theaters and on HBO Max on January 29, 2021.