The real show-stopper, however, is Don Cheadle as Mouse, Rawlins's all-but-psychopathic, gun-crazy pal from the old days (Rawlins has a bit of a past in Texas). As Monet, Beals leans more on beautiful fragility than technique, but she's fetching and mysterious enough to warrant Rawlins's romantic interest. He falls for almost every trick laid at his feet, but it's because he's new to this game-not stupid.

Washington, one of the country's most likable stars, exudes a wonderful combination of dignity and gullibility. 'Everyone was peeing on my head,' he laments in voice-over, 'and telling me it was rain.'

Unfortunately, he's in too deep to change course. He also finds himself implicated in two murders. During this quasi-comedy of errors (in which violence and comedy do a memorable fandango), Rawlins is beaten, wooed, led around the garden path and bounced around. Rawlins gets caught in compounded trouble, running afoul of Albright, the cops, a mayoral candidate called Terell (Maury Chaykin), and Monet herself, who proves to be (of course) a slippery dame. As might be expected, the mission isn't quite as simple as he'd hoped. Rawlins-whose sole qualification is his ability to move through the black section without raising suspicions-accepts Albright's offer. 'She likes jazz and pig's feet and dark meat-you know what I mean?' Albright tells him. All Rawlins has to do, Albright tells him, is find a dame called Daphne Monet (Jennifer Beals), a white politician's moll who's reportedly camped out on the dark side of town. Unemployed, and with his next house payment coming right at him, he's easy prey for shady Dewitt Albright (Tom Sizemore) who offers him $100 for a quick job. When we meet him, Rawlins has just lost his job.

A Houston transplant, fresh from an army stint in World War II, he's a regular Joe trying to buy into the American dream. And as lead character Ezekiel 'Easy' Rawlins, Denzel Washington is no card-carrying detective.

It's as much about black America as it is about Maltese falcons. 'Devil' slums elegantly through L.A.'s Central Avenue, the speakeasy strip where blacks and whites once mingled in dark, jazzy corners. But in this smoky gangster picture, there are significant, engaging differences. 'DEVIL IN a Blue Dress,' director Carl Franklin's smartly atmospheric adaptation of Walter Mosley's popular detective novel, pulls you into familiar, Chandler territory. Sexual situations, profanity and violence

Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley