Matt Lee Whitlock (Denzel Washington) is the police chief of Florida small town Banyan Key. He just cracked a big drug case confiscating $450k. He's getting divorced from fellow police officer Alex (Eva Mendes) and having an affair with Anne Merai Harrison (Sanaa Lathan) who is separated from violent husband Chris (Dean Cain). Anne has just been diagnosed with cancer, and Matt takes the $450k for Anne's treatment. However, the money, Anne and Chris all burnt up in a suspicious fire.

This has a great noir sweaty style. Matt's questionable morality is interesting. I prefer his problems be forced upon him. However most of his problems are self-inflicted by his lack of judgment. There is a lot of things that needs to be overlook in this movie. While I like the style, the story needs a little help.

Minor Spoilers

In Florida, Matt Lee Whitlock (Denzel Washington) is the local chief police. He was responsible for the prison of a great lord of drugs and had his picture stamped on the front page of many newspapers. Presently he is divorcing from his wife, the homicide detective Alex Diaz Whitlock (Eva Mendes),and has a lover, Ann Merai Harrison (Sanaa Lathan). Ann is married with the former player Chris Harrison (Dean Cain). One day, Ann goes to her doctor with Matt, and she is informed she has a terminal cancer, having a maximum of six months of life. She tries unsuccessfully to raise some money, using her insurance policy, for having a better treatment and traveling to Europe. Then, she puts Matt´s name as her primary beneficiary in the insurance policy. Matt decides to give the US$ 450,00.00 that is in custody in the police safe box, once it is the evidence against the arrested lord of drugs. The schedule for using that money in court is about two years, when Matt would return it with part of the money of the life insurance of Ann. On the next day, the house of Ann and Chris is under fire and their bodies are found completely unrecognized. Meanwhile, the DEA requests the evidence stored in the police department for some further investigation. The police investigation in the two corpuses shows that the persons were dead before the fire. Out of time, having just a couple of hours to solve the crime, Matt runs a parallel investigation of the mystery, trying to find the money. The result is very predictable. I had participated in a promotion about cinema and won the ticket for this film. Having Denzel Washington in the cast, I indeed expected a great movie. But it is not! The story, full of coincidences, clichés and very predictable, looks like a comedy not funny, or maybe a laughable police story. Maybe it works on VHS or DVD, but spending time and money going to the movie theater is not worthwhile. There are lots of B-movies much original than this one. Denzel Washington disappointed me in such a role. A similar plot was magnificently explored by David Mamet, in `The Spanish Prisoner'. But `Out of Time' is pretentious and ridiculous. My vote is five.

******************* SPOILERS ******************!!!!!!!!!!

Out of time/No way Out. The word "out" sounds awfully similar and there are multiple scenes that are taken from No Way Out. First, you can tell the writers loved that movie (and rightfully so, it's a great suspense movie) and decided to inspire themselves to write a sort of same type of movie. That's why when Matthias gets angry and shouts "just do it !!" that same line is copied off Sam, the operator, who shouts to his colleague "just do it !!". Coincidence ?

Not so much, I'm telling you, there are so many elements that are copied off No Way Out, it's ridiculous. The chief befriending the medical examiner and admitting him the plot conspiracy, just like in No Way Out, when Tom admits he's the boyfriend in the polaroid and the investigation is a cover up. At the same time Matthias has DEA goons on his back, just like Tom has Death Squad killers following him to the bathroom. AND, most of all, the action takes place in the same day !!

Is it a bad movie ? Yes, for too many obvious No Way Out spin offs. Is it entertaining ? Yes, there is suspense, there is an outrageous fight between Denzell and a con who is plotting against him, but the sex scenes are lame, the cast is a B movie cast, Mendes is good but not great, Washington is very good but the movie is really a TV production that doesn't do him justice. OK granted, there are big productions that are as about as cheesy - but the ending, please, seriously ? In 2003 that's what you come up with ? That's a totally unnecessary ending, that is nice for young girls, but it's really not very good.

If you have nothing to watch on a week day evening, then watch it, but other than that, it's forgettable.