Bloody hard work

Rating: 3/10 (4 February 2002)

I'm sorry to go against the norm here, but I didn't enjoy this one bit. Even more surprising given there's about half a dozen actors in it I really like. But It actually took me 3 attempts to hack it through to the end & sent me to sleep once at 11am after a full nights kip before.
I'm going off police films or shows anyway as too many tend to resemble extended episodes of TJ Hooker or Dempsey & Makepiece & this weren't a great deal different. It started off with some promise but degenerated into an overlong soap opera. At no point did I ever give a monkeys about Pacino's marital problems nor whether DeNiro or Kilmer sorted it out with their women.
That don't mean I like the bang-bang you're dead type police films, I like some character insight but the amount of dialogue in this was ridiculous. The script must have looked like War & Peace. The scene with Pacino & DeNiro in the restaurant summed that up. I knew as I watched it everyone would rave over it, but I still can't watch that scene, even on it's own, without my concentration waining half way through. It seemed as if the director wanted to get as many 'cool' quotes in as he could & sacrificed the tension level because of it. Thus, when the plot did get complex from time to time, with the extra characters, it really required 110% concentration at all times.
John Voight mumbled too much, Pacino shouted too much, almost Ric Flair-esque at some points, each character much have had tracking devices on each other the amount of times they bumped into each other, some of the least adept Police were on duty, there seemed far too many anonymous or convenient tip-offs and lots more was left unresolved after the end.
Over half an hour & some of the subplots could have been chopped from this film. I know it was an insight into the contrasting lives, of the 'policeman & the criminal' but it was too much insight. I rate DeNiro & Pacino as much as anyone, but lets be honest you could have an hour of the pair of them on the bog, having a dump & reading the paper out loud & there'd be a hard-core group of fans who'd still worship it.
3or4/10