Review by Kate Erbland

It’s tempting to say only Jake Gyllenhaal could play the tricky leading role of a disgraced police officer in Antoine Fuqua’s jittery “The Guilty,” but that would be silly, because icy star Jakob Cedergren did play this role — in Gustav Moller’s 2018 original. But Cedergren never went quite so crazy, got so explosive, so positively unhinged. Star-producer Gyllenhaal, who bought the rights to Moller’s film almost right out the gate, makes the film his own.

For the most part, it works. The same can be said about the film as a whole, which has gotten a snazzy, Americanized update that will likely thrill newcomers to the story and satisfy fans of the original. If you’ve seen Moller’s “The Guilty,” well, you’ve basically seen Fuqua’s, but Gyllenhaal’s performance adds a go-for-broke turn that capitalizes on the actor’s deep emotional reserves. Nic Pizzolatto’s adaptation is not as tightly wound as the original’s (penned by Moller and Emil Nygaard Albertsen), but it does build in fresh touches that add resonance.