Excellent Modern Noir

Rating: 9/10 (6 August 2006)

Well, I watched L.A. Confidential last night for the first time. An excellent example of modern film noir. A well written, brilliantly acted film. However, a couple of minor quibbles prevent me from giving this a 10, or calling it one of the great films of its time.
First, I join in praising the acting; uniformly excellent. Usually, I don't care much for Russell Crowe, but here, why, it's almost like he was born to play an unintelligent mook prone to uncontrolled fits of violence. Second, I think it's Spacey's best work that I've seen, much better than his Oscar work in the vastly overrated Usual Suspects, for instance. And James Cromwell was superb. I'm only aware of seeing him in a handful of roles; he's been good in all of them, but his turn here was a revelation. The scene where he offs Spacey jarred me. Pearce, Straitharn, and even Basinger are also memorable.
But I had a couple problems with the film, that at first blush at least keeps me from praising it too highly. First, I hated hated hated the times the director superimposed an earlier shot of a character over the screen, as if we were not smart enough to figure out that the dead girl was the prostitute with the nose job, for instance. A smart film like this one should trust the audience to get it.
Second, you know, when a character asks another one, "Would you shoot a suspect who is surrendering in the back to prevent some lawyer from getting him off?" and the character answers "No", well, you pretty much know how the movie is going to end, don't you. There's a difference between foreshadowing and telegraphing.
The movie does it a second time, too, when Spacey and Pearce are talking about how they got into police work and Pearce mentions the imaginary name he's given to the guy who killed his father, followed by a scene where Spacey whispers that name to Cromwell, followed by a scene where Cromwell asks Pearce - and only Pearce, mind you! - if he knew the guy. There is no reason for Cromwell to ask only Pearce about the guy, except to move the plot along to Pearce's recognizing that Cromwell is the villain. There were other, better, subtler ways to reach that conclusion, and the movie should have seized them.
The "rape" scene didn't work for me at all. Not for a minute. Again, it seems an obvious plot contrivance. I think it would have worked better (given that the point of the scene was to allow photos to be taken) if Basinger had been the aggressor.
Oh, and I am somewhat torn between praising the excellent cinematography and arguing the movie should have been in Black & White. Color photography diminishes noir, and neo-noir.
And last, how did Bud White survive that final shoot-out? Didn't Cromwell shoot him in the face, point blank? What, is this some sort of mystical Jules and Vince moment? Movie ends better with him dead, I think.
But still, great acting and dialog. The screenplay is intelligent and suspenseful; wonderfully shot, great music. That I still rate the film as highly as I do, with these problems, is a testament to how superb the rest of the film is.