Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Kevin Costner, Sean Connery, Andy Garcia, Robert De Niro
Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure*.
Did I Like It: I’ve been on a bit of a gangster movie kick as of late, having watched all of The Godfather films recently**, and Lora has taken to dismissing them as “Pacino De Niro Scarface movies.” I don’t know if I’d be willing to back up that assertion, but she came in and out of the room while I was watching the film, and eventually summed up her criticism of stray scenes by saying: “This film is kind of corny.”
Here, she might be on to something. Throw out a couple of truly tension-filled scenes (and even those are cribbed from Eisenstein; it’s not a vice to go watch a silent movie, folks) and there’s a movie occasionally fixated on being strangely old-fashioned. The question then becomes is that quality an earnest attempt to bring the movies back to something resembling a cop show from the 50s? Or is it a stealth commentary on that earnestness so present during those older days? I’m tempted to lean towards the latter. How could we not chuckle at a scene where Ness (Costner) and his wife (Patricia Clarkson, in her feature debut) muse about naming their new infant son after J. Edgar Hoover? Then again, how can we not collectively roll our eyes in any scene of domestic bliss when Morricone’s score positively groans under the weight of its sentimentality?
Then again, how could a movie—if even occasionally—screw up the use of a Morricone score? Is it possible I don’t like this movie… No. I do. I do.
I struggle mightily with expressing why I don’t mind all of those problems, but I don’t.
*I was definitely tempted at that moment to impart an anecdote where I once made a political speech based mostly on quotes from Sean Connery in this film. I won’t tell that story but will say: Don’t do that, but if you do, don’t worry about it. Hardly anyone will get it.
**Director’s cut on Part III, I’m not an animal.