Thursday, January 4, 2018
369 - The Friends of Eddie Coyle, United States, 1973. Dir. Peter Yates.
Eddie Coyle is tired. He is going to be turning 51 soon, and in his book that is an old man. He lives in a Boston suburb and has a wife and two children.
He also has a friend named Dillon, who runs a lunch counter-style diner in the city and who helps him gets jobs under the table.
And with friends like Dillon . . .
Eddie does odd jobs with criminals when they need him,
He drives a truck, so he has driven for his friends. He helps to run guns. He keeps his mouth shut.
During the last job he got caught. He had his fingers smashed in a drawer. And he was put on trial. He is scheduled to go to New Hampshire soon for sentencing, and he expects to get two years--maybe out in eight months--but no matter how much time, it is not something he is prepared to do.
Eddie has seen some of his friends make the big steal, get off, and move to Florida to enjoy perpetual sun. He wants to get his turn.
He has a job coming up getting guns for some bank robbers, and maybe he can use it to get himself a break. He talks to this Fed guy he knows to see if he can put in a good word for him.
If I can get you the info you need, can you get me off?
We'll see.
Eddie keeps his part of the deal. Whatever he can do. He just does not want to see his wife and children go on Welfare. He cares about them.
Eddie Coyle is played by Robert Mitchum.
Robert Mitchum is the kind of actor you could watch sitting in a chair. If he happens to play tired and "old," that is all the better. Here he plays plenty old and he is quite tired.
The film moves back and forth between the logistics of bank robberies and their preparations, and the fatigue of Eddie Croyle.
We care about Eddie. We want him to make it. To take care of his wife and children. To have his turn for a good life.
But then, we would be a different kind of friend to him than the friends he has.
* * * * *
Robert Mitchum is one of the few who can stand next to Humphrey Bogart.
When we watched Robert Montgomery's 1947 film Ride the Pink Horse, we discussed how men in the 1940s suddenly tried to act like Bogie. Montgomery tried it. Dick Powell tried it. Bugs Bunny tried it. The trend continued. In 1960 Jean-Paul Belmondo tried it. And, as we have just been watching Robert Altman films, if Criterion had The Long Goodbye (1973) out yet, then we would have just seen Elliott Gould trying it. Or at least parodying it.
Ride the Pink Horse
http://realbillbillions.blogspot.com/2017/11/329-ride-pink-horse-united-states-1947.html
Breathless
http://realbillbillions.blogspot.com/2017/04/110-breathless-1960-france-dir-jean-luc.html
Night of the Hunter
http://realbillbillions.blogspot.com/2017/01/027-night-of-hunter-1955-united-states.html
No comments:
Post a Comment