Once in the Life

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Once in the Life ★★½ 2000 (R)

Fishburne transfers his 1995 Off Broadway play “Riff Raff” to the big screen but its stage antecedents are apparent. 20/20 Mike (Fishburne) has hooked up with his heroin-addicted white half-brother Torch (Welliver) and they have trouble over a drug score gone wrong that has enraged local boss Manny (Calderon). Manny has sent henchman Tony the Tiger (Walker) to take care of things, even though Tony and Mike are old prison buddies. The film basically turns into a talky, one-set triangle leading to inevitable tragedy. 107m/C VHS, DVD . Laurence Fishburne, Titus Welliver, Eamonn Walker, Paul Calderon, Dominic Chianese, Gregory Hines, Annabella Sciorra, Michael Paul Chan, Nicholas Chinlund, Jim Breuer; D: Laurence Fishburne; W: Laurence Fishburne; C: Richard Turner; M: Branford Marsalis.