Brian de Palma’s “Domino” – Nothing Falls into Place

On the surface, legendary director Brian de Palma’s latest project, Domino, looks like it has solid potential to be a successful under-the-radar crime drama. With a cast including Nikolaj Coster-Waldeau and Carice van Houten of Game of Thrones fame, as well as the Golden Globe-nominated and Emmy-winning Guy Pearce, one might expect an entertaining thriller with well-developed characters, thought-provoking themes, and a clearly executed story. Unfortunately, Domino falls short in nearly every one of these categories.

The story itself is fairly formulaic, focusing on a terrorist plot in Copenhagen, Denmark, and providing multiple perspectives on the situation from different characters on all sides of the ordeal. Coster-Waldeau portrays Christian Toft, a police officer who finds himself, along with fellow police force member, Alex Boe (van Houten), in the crossfire between an ISIS terrorist conspiracy, the morally ambiguous CIA and case runner Joe Martin (Pearce), and Ezra Tarzi (Eriq Ebouneay)…