Courtesy of a clever script by Andy and Larry Wachowski and sizzling chemistry between Showgirls survivor Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly (Bullets Over Broadway), this noir-style thriller is unusually effective, evoking memories of classic '40s flicks and, inevitably, the Coen brothers' debut Blood Simple.

Tilly plays cocktail-dressed mob moll Violet, kept by gangster Caesar (Joe Pantoliano) in a posh apartment in an old Chicago building. Ho-hum, you're thinking, another tart in the movies, until a bit of redemption arrives in the shape of repairwoman Corky (Gershon, a mix of janitor-pants butch from the neck down, Vogue glamourpuss from the neck up), who has been hired to restore the vacant apartment next door. Just out of prison for 'the redistribution of wealth', Corky is promptly seduced by the Sapphic siren Violet ("I know what I am, I don't need a big tattoo on my arm to prove it"), who finally decides she wants out of the underworld. She also reveals to Corky here desire to purloin two million dollars that Caesar is holding for big boss Marzzone (Richard C Sarafian), and Corky can't resist engineering a slick plan of theft, one that will not only frame Caesar, but trick him into thinking someone else had masterminded the heist.

As the tension unfolds, the protagonists become bound by risk and desire, and the suspense never disappoints. The nifty camerawork doubles the entertainment value, milking each segment for nearly all the stress and danger it's worth. Nearly, because Corky is bound and gagged in a closet for too many vital moments of the action, an odd decision considering she is so butch she embodies every dyke stereotype around (wrap-around tattoos, box of tools, pick-up truck, ex-con, wears jockeys, converses like Eastwood in High Plains Drifter). All that strutting sinew and she can't get but a couple of swings in?

Who knows if the Wachowski brothers initially thought of lesbianism as a kinky sell? In any case, by the time the actors get through with it, synergy caused a remarkable product to gel. Some of the best films emerge with a life all of their own, regardless of preconceived fancy.