After being involved in a shoot-out at a mid-town Manhattan movie house where her partner Nick,Jamey Sheridan, was stabbed and sent to the hospital and the perpetrator shot and killed New York Police Detective Emily Eden, Madaline Griffith, after being cleared of using unnecessary force is put on light duty on a missing person case in the Brooklyn Hasidic community.

Yaakov Klausman, Jake Webber, hasn't been see or heard from since he went to his office in the diamond district in mid-town Manhattan and also missing is the $720,000.00 in uncut diamonds that he had with him at the time. Det. Eden is certain that Yaakov didn't steal the diamonds and left the country. Yaakov's very honest and he's also about to get married to a beautiful Hasidic young woman Mara, Tracy Pollan.He also has no history of gambling and doing things that would drive him to commit a robbery to pay off Mafia loan sharks or neighborhood Shylock's.

The fact that Yaakov was at his office that night was that he fell far behind in his work as he was preparing to get married to Mara and needed the time to catch up with his work and finish it before he's married. Emily feels that Yaakov was robbed by someone in the Hassidic community that he knew and trusted and even worse she feels that he may very well have been murdered. Some time later Emily proves to be sadly right in her assumptions when Yaakov is found dead in a crawl space in his office. What was a simple missing person case grew into a murder and robbery of over $700,000.00 in diamonds. Even worse for the family and friends of Yaakov as well as the entire Hasidic community that he lived in is that the killer may very well have been one of their own.

The movie "A Stranger Among Us" is very much like the 1985 Harrison Ford film "Witness" and has been criticized by many people for ripping off that film even though "Witness" ripped off the John Wayne Western "Angel and the Badman" that was made back in 1947. Still nobody made a big deal about that when the movie was released some 38 years later. In fact the movie "A Stranger Among Us" is obviously based on a true story, even though for some strange reason it doesn't take any credit for it: The 1977 Yom Kipper eve murder and robbery of Brooklyn diamond broker Pinchos Jaroslawicz by fellow jewelry dealer Sholomo Tal of over $1,000,000.00 in diamonds. Tal was someone whom Jaroslawicz dealt with and trusted for some time. The only difference is that in the movie the killer of Yaakov Klushman was a Hasid but the real killer of Jaroslawicz was an non religious Israeli Jew as well as a former member of the elite Israeli Army Commandos.

Madeline Griffith is very effective as an undercover policewoman in the Hasidic community trying to track down a killer but she had trouble with the people there because they felt that no Hasid would murder one of their own. It's only later that they find out that there's bad among all men and women no matter how law abiding their supposed to be.

Even though Madiline Griffith was the star of the movie it was really actor Eric Thal who played the grand Rebe's, Lee Richardson, adopted son Ariel who stole, figuratively not literally, the acting honors in the film. Quiet and humble as well as sensitive and courageous he saved both Emily and his sister Leah, Mia Sara,from the killer by shooting the killer, with Emily's handgun. After he told the murderer to just leave his sister and Emily alone and leave and he wouldn't do anything to stop the killer from escaping.

There was also a number of very funny ,as well as touching, scenes between Emily and Ariel where in one of them Ariel is alone with Emily and tries to keep from falling in love with her, which you can see that he's doing. Emily plays on his steadfast religious convictions by exposing her legs and offering him an éclair which Ariel refuses telling Emily that it isn't kosher. There's also a scene where Ariel for the first time, when he's with Emily, watches a movie on TV that's a 1930's musical with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers and is really touched and impressed with the movie. Even though he has no idea who Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are.

There's also a very young James Grandoifini who plays Tony in the "The Sopranos" playing, what else, a Mafia protection enforcer named Tony Baldessari together with his hulking brother Chris, the late Chris Latta. In the end Emily turned out to be right about who murdered Yaakov but even she had no idea just how close the killer was to him and his family.

Detective Emily Eden (Melanie Griffith) is an aggressive NYPD detective. Her partner Nick gets shot. She is assigned to find a missing Hasidic Jew named Yaakov. She discovers that he's been killed and $720k of diamonds are missing. She thinks it's an inside job and goes undercover in the community with the help of the rebbe's adopted son (Eric Thal) and daughter Leah (Mia Sara). Mara (Tracy Pollan) is Yaakov's widow.

Melanie Griffith is horrible as the tough as nail cop. She is laughable at the role. Then she goes into the conservative Jewish world like a bull in a china shop. It's an interesting world but it's treated with a heavy hand by Griffith's flirtatious character. Director Sidney Lumet has the wrong leading lady and it's too broadly written anyways. I'm sure a modern policewoman undercover in the Hasidic world could be interesting but Griffith is not doing it right.

I do love Sidney Lumet and most of the films he's done in his storied career. Even in A Stranger Among Us his love for his city of New York shines through. And he's Jewish which should have told him that this was a script to stay away from.

Melanie Griffith stars as a New York City homicide cop who catches the case of a young Hassidic man who works in the diamond district as many do stabbed to death. His occupation could have been the cause of his demise or it might be more personal.

In any event she decides to go live in Williamsburg among the Hassidic Jews the better to catch the killer. While there she develops sexual heat with Eric Thal, son of the Grand Rebbe in the sect. In a reverse of those old Doris Day and Sandra Dee roles it's the man zealously guarding his virtue. He's the planned successor and no Shiksa is going to disrupt that.

I'm sorry there's no way on God's green earth that the Hassidim would have cooperated with a female and a non-Jew in an investigation of anything. They're that insular and Sidney Lumet knew that.

Only the most ignorant of Goyim will buy for a second A Stranger Among Us.