Law & Order (TV Series) For Love or Money (2001) User Reviews

The Widow Bottom Feeds

[bkoganbing · 8/10 · 8 September 2009]

Another one of the great Law and Order episodes is this one with two apparently unconnected murders of an ex-con and the owner of an electrical appliance business get connected by Jerry Orbach and Jesse L. Martin.

The real story here is how the culprit eventually gets justice through the legal system. Cathy Moriarty is the wife of the owner who hired the ex-con to kill her husband and this is one evil woman. I can't say more except the scope of her own malevolence gets turned against her from an unexpected source.

There is one other performance of note here, he has only one scene, in fact it's his sole credit listed on IMDb. But Jamie Lorenzo plays a "bottom feeding shyster" as he's described. He has to be one in real life because he comes over as so oily and so unctuous that he must do this in real life and did this role as a lark.

The black widow

[TheLittleSongbird · 9/10 · 23 May 2022]

While liking the previous two Season 12 episodes, in the case of "Who Let the Dogs Out?" it was liked it very much, they didn't wow me. Lots of great things, while with a couple of not so minor drawbacks (one of them being a big stick out like a sore thumb problem ever since they were introduced). While the story is not a novel one, "For Love or Money" sounded very interesting on paper. Definitely had me more excited prior to watching than the previous two episodes.

"For Love or Money" is a great episode. While not quite a 'Law and Order' high point, it is one of the best episodes of Season 12 and one of the conceptually not so novel stories feel fresh. Also benefitting from a great guest star. Nearly everything works in "For Love or Money" and hardly anything disappoints, there are not many outings in Season 12 that would be recommended without hesitation personally but this is one of them.

The one drawback is Southerlyn continuing to be too much of a cold fish and Elisabeth Rohm is still too robotic. Things that were never solved when on the show.

Cannot fault the rest of the cast. Jerry Orbach and Jesse L. Martin are such a well matched pair, Orbach does relish his one liners, and Sam Waterston is both ruthless and authoritative. His way of thinking when getting to the truth is a big part of the tension. As is the chillingly malevolent guest performance of Cathy Moriarty, her character is on the obvious side but Moriarty's acting is so unsettling that that doesn't matter.

Production values are slick and professional, not ever resorting to cheap or untested gimmicks or anything. The music is haunting in the right places and isn't constant or too loud, and the direction gives the drama urgency and breathing space. The script is thoughtful and intriguing with a lot of tautness in the legal scenes, can't get enough of Briscoe's one liners too.

While the story is very compelling in both halves, the second half is better than the first in many episodes or in a good number of them even better and "For Love or Money" is an example of the latter. The tension is high and it is very easy to root for a conviction with a perpetrator so detestable.

Summing up, great. 9/10.

Penelope Cruz? Yeah, I was home sleeping. She was in my dreams.

[Mrpalli77 · 9/10 · 11 November 2017]

A couple of teenagers high on weed had difficulties in finding their black car in a parking lot. Suddenly they bumped into a dead man killed from a small caliber gun. Detectives realized at first sight he was a low-level criminal after looking up his wallet: he had several fake ID and they need to match his prints to figure out what would be the real one. The victim used to be in and out of prison, where he made the acquaintance of another lowlife with whom he started a burglary scam. Then detectives manage to connect the dots: the victim played a crucial role in another homicide took place seven years back and he harassed the sender because he needed more money. A wealthy woman (Cathy Moriarty), a piece of work used to change husbands every time they faced financial troubles, was the prime suspect. But you have to wait till the ending when a plot twist takes place.

A nice episode, where I enjoyed the trial in which the defense attorney is sharp in dismantling a witness testimony. After so many years, at the end the student has become the master.

Slipping quality episodes

[michaelangellcanfield · 6/10 · 24 February 2022]

I don't know if it's fair to hang the slightly lackluster performance of the first episodes of season 12 on this one, but that's the impression it left on me. I could see the episode rating an 8 in season 8, and it's rough plot line solution is similar to a couple other (and better) L&O eps. Best part of the episode: the fantastic scene of the mob boss giving Briscoe and Greene his on-site expertise on knocking someone off at the crime scene.