I don't cheat on my taxes... you can't cheat on something you never committed to.

Rampart

(2011)

Woody Harrelson has been justly feted for his performance as a corrupt cop under investigation, but the film as a whole doesn’t quite come together. The verité camera work and loose structure (we follow Dave “Date Rape” Brown on the job, off the job, at home, the through line being the inexorable disintegration of his life) lend a fly-on-the-wall documentary sense to the coverage of his tribulations, although stylistic flourishes are employed to amp-up a sense of point-of-view (Harrelson on a drugs-fuelled binge for example). The array of micro-roles (more than cameos, but you couldn’t call them proper supporting parts) include Sigourney Weaver, Ben Foster, Ice Cube, Ned Beatty and Anne Heche, but the most time is spent on the fractured relationship between Dave and his estranged lesbian daughter.

Perhaps the most striking characteristic of Dave, since the racism, sexism and general misanthropy are fairly common currency in the depiction of onscreen law enforcement these days, is his eloquent ability to respond to the system investigating him. This contrasts with his brutality and blinkeredness elsewhere. At one point Ned Beatty’s retired cop observes that when Dave joined the force he was unsure if he was an idiot or just bull-headed – there’s certainly no sense of the former although at times the dialogue (good as it is) has an over-written quality that brings to mind Dave’s suggestion to his daughter that she rehearsed a slice of vitriol aimed at him. I’m not sure a found footage movie scripted by David Mamet wouldn’t feel just as jarring.

I noted the comments earlier in this thread that the ending was disappointing/ abrupt; I didn’t especially feel that as it was clear Dave was fucked early on, whether this was spelled out in a scene or not. But the lack of finality does reinforce the sense that being willfully unstructured ultimately works against its impact.

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Comments

Mondo bizarro. No offence man, but you’re in way over your head.

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You have done well to keep so much hair, when so many’s after it.

Jeremiah Johnson (1972) (SPOILERS) Hitherto, I was most familiar with Jeremiah Johnson in the form of a popular animated gif of beardy Robert Redford smiling and nodding in slow zoom close up (a moment that is every bit as cheesy in the film as it is in the gif). For whatever reason, I hadn’t mustered the enthusiasm to check out the 1970s’ The Revenant until now (well, beard-wise, at any rate). It’s easy to distinguish the different personalities at work in the movie. The John Milius one – the (mythic) man against the mythic landscape; the likeably accentuated, semi-poetic dialogue – versus the more naturalistic approach favoured by director Sydney Pollack and star Redford. The fusion of the two makes for a very watchable, if undeniably languorous picture. It was evidently an influence on Dances with Wolves in some respects, although that Best Picture Oscar winner is at greater pains to summon a more sensitive portrayal of Native Americans (and thus, perversely, at times a more patr

I tell you, it saw me! The hanged man’s asphyx saw me!

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You’re a disgrace, sir... Weren’t you at Harrow?

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Isn’t it true, it’s easier to be a holy man on the top of a mountain?

The Razor’s Edge (1984) (SPOILERS) I’d hadn’t so much a hankering as an idle interest in finally getting round to seeing Bill Murray’s passion project. Partly because it seemed like such an odd fit. And partly because passion isn’t something you tend to associate with any Murray movie project, involving as it usually does laidback deadpan. Murray, at nigh-on peak fame – only cemented by the movie he agreed to make to make this movie – embarks on a serious-acting-chops dramatic project, an adaptation of W Somerset Maugham’s story of one man’s journey of spiritual self-discovery. It should at least be interesting, shouldn’t it? A real curio? Alas, not. The Razor’s Edge is desperately turgid.

My Doggett would have called that crazy.

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You know what I sometimes wish? I sometimes wish I were ordinary like you. Ordinary and dead like all the others.

Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964) (SPOILERS) Bryan Forbes’ adaptation of Mark McShane’s 1961’s novel has been much acclaimed. It boasts a distinctive storyline and effective performances from its leads, accompanied by effective black-and-white cinematography from Gerry Turpin and a suitably atmospheric score from John Barry. I’m not sure Forbes makes the most of the material, however, as he underlines Séance on a Wet Afternoon ’s inherently theatrical qualities at the expense of its filmic potential.

A ship is the finest nursery in the world.

A High Wind in Jamaica (1965) (SPOILERS) An odd one, this, as if Disney were remaking The Swiss Family Robinson for adults. One might perhaps have imagined the Mouse House producing it during their “Dark Disney” phase. But even then, toned down. After all, kids kidnapped by pirates sounds like an evergreen premise for boy’s own adventuring (more girl’s own here). The reality of Alexander Mackendrick’s film is decidedly antithetical to that; there’s a lingering feeling, despite A High Wind in Jamaica ’s pirates largely observing their distance, that things could turn rather nasty (and indeed, if Richard Hughes’ 1929 novel had been followed to the letter, they would have more explicitly).

The best thing in the world for the inside of a man or a woman is the outside of a horse.

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Schnell, you stinkers! Come on, raus!

Private’s Progress (1956) (SPOILERS) Truth be told, there’s good reason sequel I’m Alright Jack reaps the raves – it is, after all, razor sharp and entirely focussed in its satire – but Private’s Progress is no slouch either. In some respects, it makes for an easy bedfellow with such wartime larks as Norman Wisdom’s The Square Peg (one of the slapstick funny man’s better vehicles). But it’s also, typically of the Boulting Brothers’ unsentimental disposition, utterly remorseless in rebuffing any notions of romantic wartime heroism, nobility and fighting the good fight. Everyone in the British Army is entirely cynical, or terrified, or an idiot.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

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