Watching the Detectives

Watching the Detectives is a 2007 American romantic comedy film written and directed by Paul Soter. The film stars Cillian Murphy as the film geek owner of an independent video rental store whose life is turned upside down when a femme fatale (Lucy Liu) comes into his life. The film had its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival on May 1, 2007, and was released on DVD in the United States on August 12, 2008. Plot On a dark film noir black-and-white scene where a 1940s style detective shoots a villain—for trying to return a late video. The lights come up, revealing that we are watching a commercial for Gumshoe Video, and the detective is Neil, the store's owner, who is premiering the ad for friends at a party at his modest cinephile video store. His girlfriend Denise, who appears in the commercial, does not show up at the celebration. The next day, Neil meets Denise at a restaurant, but before he goes to the table, he gets a waiter to spill a glass of water on her, just to watch her overreact. She is not amused by the prank, and tells him he needs to get his life together instead of just watching movies and playing immature games. He casually breaks up with her, telling her she is not enough like Katharine Ross in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.