398 - Homicide, United States, 1991. Dir. David Mamet.

Friday, February 2, 2018

398 - Homicide, United States, 1991.  Dir. David Mamet.

Bobby Gold and Tim Sullivan are partners in Homicide.  Detectives.  Bobby is the Negotiator.

They had been told to stand down on the Randolph case.  The FBI was taking over.  So they stood down.

Now the Mayor is angry.  Embarrassed.  And he wants his man.  Somebody get Randolph.

The FBI goes in.  SWAT goes in.  They break in.  They kill a woman in bed.  They kill a man.  Collateral damage.  Oh, well.

Randolph gets away.

Back at the station heads are gonna roll.  Somebody get Randolph.  The Mayor is angry.

Gold and Sullivan can get Randolph.  They could have gotten him any time you wanted.  They know where he works.  They know the gym where he trains.  They know his brother.  If Randolph is ever not where they expect him, they can find him through his brother.  Willie Sims.  Willie Sims hates police stations.  Willie Sims will squeal.

Mr. Patterson, the man from the Mayor's office, screams at them.

Why did you not get Randolph?

Because you told us to stand down.

The Mayor is angry.

You told us to stand down.

Why have you not worked this case?

There was no case.  The Lieu passed it down to us.  You told us to stand down.

Patterson makes it personal.  Then he makes it racial.

He is a politician, after all.  Facts are not important to him.  Emotions are.  Perceptions are.  The Mayor's anger is.

So he uses whatever tools are at his immediate disposal to manipulate others to get what he wants.

And to punish capaciously those that defy him.

Like the FBI SWAT team that just sprayed the room with machine gun fire.  And left the woman and the man dead.

Collateral damage.

Oh well.

Bobby Gold does not particularly wish to be collateral damage.  He is a good man.  And a good cop.  With a good partner.  And a good team.  In a good department.  On a good force.

Mr. Patterson is black.  Bobby is Jewish.  Bobby has said nothing about race.  The department is composed of mixed race.  Of brothers of mixed races.  Brothers who will die for each other.

But Patterson uses a racial slur against Bobby.  It is a tool at his disposal to manipulate others.  To get what he wants.  Like a machine gun.

Sully--Bobby's partner Tim Sullivan, that is--defends Bobby.  All the members of the department defend Bobby.  Lieu--Lieutenant Senna, that is--defends Bobby.

Let us go get Randolph.  We can do it any day of the week.  We know where he is.  And if we do not, then we can get his brother.  Willie Sims hates police stations.  Willie Sims will squeal.

But just before Bobby leaves he has an encounter with a suicidal suspect just brought in for killing his family.  Who lunges at Bobby to get his gun to commit suicide.  He bruises Bobby's head and breaks his holster.  And that just might be a problem later in the movie.

On the way to get Randolph, Bobby and Sully stumble upon a brand-new crime scene.  A Rookie is standing crouched behind his car ready to fire.  His Partner is trapped inside.  Trapped by an angry dog.  Bobby takes care of it.  He takes care of the Partner.  He guides the Rookie.  He finds the body of the dead woman just shot in the back in the candy store.

We are in a black ghetto.

The woman is Jewish.

Or was.

Why was she there?  Why would she stay?

Maybe they killed her for the fortune she kept hidden in her basement.

Or so the neighborhood kids say.

Sully has taken the car and gone on to get Randolph.  Bobby is trying desperately to contain the scene and turn it over to the Sergeant when he arrives.  So that Bobby can go join Sully and get Randolph.  Bobby is the Negotiator.  They need him.

And now we have the dilemma.

We have the first case.  The Randolph case.  The kind of case for which Bobby got into police work.  The one that will get him awarded.  Promoted.  Commended.  The one at which he excels.  About which he feels so passionately.  About which he feels so personally.

Because of Mr. Patterson from the Mayor's office.  And maybe Commissioner Walker as well.

This is his chance to settle the score.

Bobby needs to settle scores.  There is something from his past.  From his childhood.  From the way he was treated growing up.  That causes him to need to get to a scene first.  To go into a building first.  To go into a room first.  To prove something.

Then we have the second case.  The Jewish woman at the candy store case.  And her family.  her family who keeps Bobby on a tight leash.  They pay a lot in taxes.  They have influence.  They know Bobby is Jewish too.  They know he does not desire to help them.  They are going to make sure he does.

And somewhere along the way, down in that woman's basement, and up on the family's roof, he is going to have to face himself.  To find himself.  To deal with questions left unsettled for years.

About being Jewish.  And about people that do not want them.  And a history that is still being played out on the streets of this city.

Whichever city it is.  When it is Mamet you think Chicago.  But the film was filmed in Baltimore.  I believe they made it neutral.  So that it could be Everycity.

But regardless of where we are, we are playing out History in the streets still today.

Bobby will be ordered to stay on the second case.  Yet he will quietly keep working the first case.  And then he will start working a kind of third case.  The historical-personal case.

And all of these threads will intertwine and unravel together.

And things just might get pretty messy.

The film is led by Joe Montegna and William H. Macy.  And filled with Mamet's stable of actors from The Atlantic Theater Company.

It was written by Mamet and filmed by Roger Deakins.  The man now known as the Coen Brother's DP (meaning William H. Macy worked with Deakins again on Fargo).  And for The Shawshank Redemption (1994).  And Dead Man Walking (1995).  And Courage Under Fire (1996).  And The Siege (1998).  And The Hurricane (1999).  And A Beautiful Mind (2001).  And House of Sand and Fog (2003).  Well, it keeps going.  The list is long.  He has been nominated for 14 Oscars.  Let us just say the point I am making is that Mamet is working with a major cinematographer on this movie.

Movies are made of words and pictures.  Logos and Ikon.  The writer sees pictures and then writes words.  The director and actors and crew read words and then make pictures.

David Mamet the word man and Roger Deakins the picture man come together to make a movie.

And they choreograph it like a symphony.

David Mamet published A Life in the Theater in 1977.  A play about two men in the theatre and all the different experiences they have had.  Mamet culled it from his own experience in the theatre.  He then founded The Atlantic Theater Company in 1985.  After having taught for years at New York University.  In other words, he was already a veteran of the stage in the 1970s.

So imagine what he brought to the table by way of choreographing the actors in 1991.

And imagine what Deakins brought to the table by way of choreographing the camera.

And then have Production Designer Michael Merritt build a police station in an old school building.  And fill it with the theatre actors who have been working together with David and/or at The Atlantic Theatre for years.

And you have a scene where two people--or three or five or eight or ten--move around the room as naturally as a finely tuned cello with the camera following them as naturally as a finely played bow.

Mamet writes the dialogue for the specific actors, as he knows their personalities from working with them for years.  And the actors understand Mamet's style of writing.

He has a unique voice.  And it demands that the actor spend time with it and understand it before speaking the speech trippingly on the tongue.

The words matter.

The images matter.

The two together make the movie.

Joe Montagna is a beautiful actor to watch.  He has been working with Mamet at least as far back as 1974, when he performed in the world premiere of Sexual Perversity in Chicago, the play that formed the basis of the movie About Last Night (1986).

William H. Macy might go back even further with Mamet.  He studied with him at Goddard College, from which he graduated in 1972.  He originated several roles from Mamet plays.

So by 1991 these men have been working together a long time.  And their ease with each other shines on the screen.

Mamet lists some of the directors he admires.  Then he says, "Most of these guys had their own rep companies, and they always worked with the same actors."

To have a company.

A company of actors.  Writers.  And directors.

The gestating place.

Soil for the seed.

This is a good thing.

And this is a good movie.  A complex movie.  A movie that goes where you do not expect it.  And leaves you wanting to know more.

And leaves you feeling for Bobby.

And for a family.

And for a people.

And for a mother.

I believe people's awareness of this movie will grow over time.