Placebo Effect

B for effort. C for execution

They tried, they really tried to be Mamet. It is set in Chicago, there are twists in the plot, the dialog is stilted and but informative, there is dramatic gun-play, the situations are contrived, there are hidden motivations. Even the actress Berman (would really like to see more of her) resembles Eisenstadt from Oleanna. But in the end, too much information that was not presented in the movie becomes relevant to the unraveling and the characters were not distinct from one another. Another key about Mamet that this movie lacked is that his dialog is stilted, but it usually accelerates to become rapid-fire and intelligent near the climax, where this movie did not. I still did think a bit about it though AFTER the curtain fell. I'd be interested to see what some seasoning does to the next production from this team.