Movie historian Leonard Maltin seemed to agree with Attanasio, giving "TLADILA" 1.5 stars out of a possible four: "Try to imagine "Miami Vice" on the West Coast...here you have it. This picture is so gritty that it's hard to root for anybody...since the good guys are as foul-mouthed, greedy, and sadistic as the bad guys...! For a crack Secret Service agent and a master counterfeiter, both Dafoe and Petersen act pretty dumb; Friedkin delivers one of the most spectacular car chases since his own "French Connection", along with a galvanizing score by Wang Chung, but even that's not enough to counteract the bad taste this film leaves behind."