After decades in which he built a career as arguably the most acclaimed film actor in the US, Robert De Niro eventually appeared to decide to cash in on his fame and go for more commercial efforts. This led to projects such as 2001’s 15 Minutes.

Eastern European criminals Oleg Razgul (Oleg Taktarov) and Emil Slovek (Karel Roden) come to New York to collect their share of a heist. When this goes wrong, they commit murder and head out on the lam.

As Oleg uses a stolen video camera to document their illegal shenanigans, they find even greater reward from the way the media slobbers over their taped endeavors. Veteran homicide detective Eddie Flemming (De Niro) and NYFD arson investigator Jordy Warsaw (Edward Burns) form an awkward partnership to stop the pair of violent felons.

Going into the film, I assumed 15 Minutes would relate to some kind of ticking clock involved in the plot. Instead, the title connects to the famous notion that “in the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes”.

Because the baddies here use their escapades to attempt to make themselves legends, the title links to their stabs at fleeting stardom. This implies 15 Minutes will come with a certain level of social commentary ala 1994’s satirical Natural Born Killers.

Indeed, the first act or so of Minutes leads us in this direction. We see the impact of tabloid TV and the manner in which media attention impacts the European criminals.

However, 15 Minutes essentially abandons this conceit pretty quickly. It uses Oleg’s desire to film their exploits as little more than a gimmick to present some ugly first-person footage as a weak stab at verisimilitude.

While 15 Minutes does revisit the media element at times in the second half, this all feels like windowdressing. It creates a standard cop thriller with little imagination at work.

In theory, the social commentary connected to the tale should add some charge, but it seems like a cheap construct that never goes anywhere. The end product suffers from wildly inconsistent tonal choices and fails to mesh.

If 15 Minutes offered a dark comedy, maybe it might’ve worked. If it stayed with the serious cop thriller, maybe it might’ve worked.

Unfortunately, its inability to decide where it wants to go or to combine its facets in a convincing manner turns it into a mess. 15 Minutes tosses a lot at the screen that it fails to make stick.

At the risk of redundancy, the filmmakers’ inability to allow the mix of tones to flow becomes a terrible issue. It goes from tragedy to action to romance to satire with no coherence at all, and these shifts undercut any potential positives that we otherwise might find.

Perhaps it might seem unfair that I implied De Niro took 15 Minutes just as a paycheck, for maybe he thought the premise might make it something lively and vivid. As I watch the final product, though, I must succumb to my cynical side and think that De Niro agreed to work here mainly to advance his “brand” and not because he figured it’d offer a quality project.

15 Minutes attempts a major twist that I admit comes as a surprise. However, it ends up as nothing more than cynical audience manipulation that degrades a tacky film even more.

We do find a pretty solid cast here. In addition to those already mentioned, the movie features Vera Farmiga, Charlize Theron, Kelsey Grammer, Avery Brooks, Kim Cattrall and David Alan Grier.

Too bad they work in the service of such a flawed movie. Despite some promising elements, 15 Minutes winds up as trite and silly.

Footnote: a little extra footage shows up early in the end credits.

15 Minutes appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.40:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. For the most part, the film came with an appealing image.

We got visuals with some intentional anomalies, as parts of the movie used the POV of a consumer-grade video camera. Unsurprisingly, these looked terrible.

Otherwise, the image usually fared fine. Sharpness usually looked good, as the movie mostly seemed accurate. Some softness impacted wider shots at times but the majority of the flick delivered solid delineation.

No issues with jagged edges or moiré effects materialized, and I saw only light edge haloes at times. Print flaws failed to manifest.

The film opted for an oversaturated palette that favored reds and blues. These veered a bit heavy but that seemed to be the intention so the Blu-ray appeared to replicate them well.

Blacks felt deep and dark, while shadows offered positive clarity. Despite a few modest issues, the presentation mainly satisfied.

In addition, the movie’s DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack held up well. With a decent mix of action, the soundfield kicked to life nicely when necessary.

A major scene that involved a fire turned into the most vivid sonic sequence, but other cop-related domains added verve as well. Music showed nice spread, and the soundscape brought a fine sense of city streets and locations too.

Audio quality satisfied, with speech that remained concise and natural. Music showed good breadth and dimensionality.

Effects appeared accurate and full, and they offered deep bass as well. I thought the mix fit the film in a positive manner.

We get a mix of extras here, and these launch with an audio commentary from writer/director John Herzfeld. He provides a running, screen-specific look at the project’s origins and development, story/characters, cast and performances, sets and locations, research and realism, music, editing, photography and connected domains.

At times Herzfeld tends to simply narrate the movie, and those moments can make the track drag. However, he provides more than enough good content to negate these lapses, so expect a generally positive piece.

Two featurettes follow, and True Tabloid Stars runs 15 minutes, five seconds. It presents comments from TV producer/Tabloid Baby author Burt Kearns, CourtTV reporter Michael Ayala, and TV hosts Sally Jesse Raphael, Jerry Springer, Maury Povich, and Deborah Norville.

The show looks at aspects of “tabloid TV” and how that genre impacted talk shows as well. I like the inclusion of some of the field’s big names and this becomes an interesting overview.

Does Crime Pay? goes for 21 minutes, 13 seconds. It delivers notes from attorney Gloria Allred, former LAPD Detective Mark Fuhrman, author Aphrodite Jones, filmmaker Ted Haimes, and Loyola Law School’s Stan Goldman.

All chat together to discuss how society makes criminals famous or wealthy. Despite the shady nature of some participants – especially the disgraced Fuhrman – they maintain an intriguing interaction nonetheless.

Six Deleted Scenes span a total of 11 minutes, 36 seconds. The longest – four minutes, eight seconds – and most substantial involves a chase. It brings some thrills and seems like a strange choice for the filmmakers to omit.

Otherwise, the snippets prove fairly inconsequential. They deliver minor character tidbits but lean toward unnecessary filler.

Despite a good cast and some intriguing story points, 15 Minutes proves far too brain dead to succeed. It combines tonal choices in a clumsy manner that means it never connects. The Blu-ray offers largely positive picture and audio as well as a mix of bonus features. This one ends up as a forgettable and awkward mix of satire and thriller.

Note that 15 Minutes originally hit Blu-ray in 2015. This 2025 reissue offers a literal duplicate of that release, so don't expect any differences between the two in any way.