One of the best things to come out of the Film Noir Era is the Neo Noir style of film making. (I will devote a new post entirely to this subject.) Neo Noir movies push the boundaries of Noir in terms of plot, characters and geographics. While this novel is set in LA of the 40s like many film noir movies, it differs from film noir as it has an African American protagonist, ‘Easy’ Rawlins played marvelously by Denzel Washington.

‘Devil in a Blue Dress’ directed by Carl Franklin, based on Walter Mosey’s book of the same name. After being layed. of from an aircraft company, Rawlins is hanging around in his usual watering hole when bartender Joppy introduces him to Albright, a white private investigator.

Albright asks Rawlins to locate Daphne Monet, a white woman, engaged to a mayoral candidate, who had now absconded forcing her fiance, Carter to quit from the electoral race. Easy finds Coretta, a friend and confidant of Daphne in a bar. After seducing Coretta, Rawlins gets her to tell him that Daphne is involved with a black hoodlum, Frank Green.

As Rawlins gets more involved in finding the elusive Daphne, a series of events would put Rawlins’ life in peril. Coretta is murdered. Rawlins then has a rough encounter with the LAPD, and then is accosted by Terrell, the mayoral candidate who is running against Cater.

Rawlins manages to find Daphne, and the two of them would then stumble on a gruesome murderous scene. Daphne, flees the scene, only to disappear again. Gangsters would then pay Rawlins a visit, that he would seek the assistance of his hair-triggered, gun touting friend, Mouse(Don Cheadle). An explosive shootout is in the offing.

Whether Rawlins manages to save Daphne in time and unlock the mystery involving her forms the rest of the story. The film also takes a look at racism in all its forms, some subtle and some blatant, which existed then and continues to exist today. One aspect that needs to be mentioned is Don Cheadle’s role. Yes, he had a juicy role that he played to perfection. It is not easy to steal the spotlight from Denzel Washington. Cheadle manages to pull it off. One question I will not answer is, if there is a Femme Fatal in this movie. With its private eye, gangsters, self serving politicians and crooked cops, ‘Devil in a Blue Dress’ has made its mark as one of the best Neo Noir films ever made.