Director Sidney Lumet's 45th picture takes its title from an Irish toast that says: "May you be in heaven half an hour before the devil knows you're dead."

And most of the characters in this melodrama would be ripe for the clutches of the devil, given their sins of murder, infidelity, drug use, theft, hatred and bloodthirsty quest for vengeance.

"Before the Devil Knows You're Dead," written by playwright-turned-screenwriter Kelly Masterson, stars Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke as brothers in different but desperate financial straits.

Hoffman is Andy, a real-estate broker with a six-figure salary, a clandestine drug habit and a trophy wife (Marisa Tomei, showing off her trim trophy body). Hawke is Hank, his weak-willed younger brother who is three months behind in his child support, as his ex-wife shrilly reminds him.

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'Before the Devil Knows You're Dead'

• Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Albert Finney.
• Rating: R for a scene of strong graphic sexuality, nudity, violence, drug use and language.

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Andy proposes a scheme to Hank, calling it the "easiest money we'll ever get. ... It's safe. Nobody gets hurt. Everybody wins."

They will rob a mom-and-pop jewelry store -- actually their Mom and Pop's jewelry store, located in a suburban strip mall outside New York. Their parents will recoup their losses through insurance, the brothers will fence the goods and split the proceeds.

But we know from an early scene in the movie that it's not safe. People do get hurt. And nobody wins.

"Before the Devil" is told out of sequence, as if the story were a mirror that had been shattered and the shards were being reassembled. Each time a new piece is put into place, the image and perspective changes slightly.

Knowing that the robbery has gone wrong casts a sinister shadow over the optimistic plans that, thanks to the time-toggling, come later. It's like seeing an accident before you round the bend in the road; the people in the car don't know what hit them, but you do.

That contributes to the tension in this adult (sex, nudity, violence) thriller that allows Hoffman to move from confident to cold to so tightly wound that you can see the pulsing of a facial muscle and, then, to vulnerable and pleading.

The pounds Hoffman shed to play Truman Capote in 2005 are mostly back, and he carries them as if they represented the increasing weight of his troubles. Add to that the production design that places him against splashes of red or black to underscore the mood.

In a family with enough disappointment and dysfunction for a week of Dr. Phil episodes, Hawke makes Hank boyish and immature, from his shaggy haircut to his inability to handle a stressful situation. He bows out with "There's no way I can make this scene," as if he were a teen instead of a capable and culpable adult.

The supporting cast also includes a vigorous Albert Finney as the men's father, Rosemary Harris as their mother and Amy Ryan (from "Gone Baby Gone") as Hank's sharp-tongued former wife, plus Brian O'Byrne and Michael Shannon as shady characters drawn into the brothers' plot and Leonardo Cimino as a crooked diamond dealer.

"The world's an evil place," the jeweler says in the best-delivered line of the movie. "Some of us make money off of it, some of us are destroyed."

As the evil spreads like a toxic oil spill, the destruction becomes more memorable ... although harder to accept and stomach.