One of the best films of the '90s

Rating: 10/10 (26 January 2001)

"L.A. Confidential" is a great movie. This complex mystery-thriller set in 1950s Los Angeles has great acting, great directing, great writing, great just about everything. Here is one of those rare films that pulls you into the story and never lets go. I love it when a movie does that. The main storyline of "L.A. Confidential" is about a gruesome mass murder in a nearby diner that has connections with the corrupt L.A. police department. One of the men killed in the slaughter was an L.A. cop. The movie follows two different detectives who try to find who committed the crime and who is connected to it. Russell Crowe, and Guy Pearce portray the two detectives, both very different from each other. Crowe is Bud White, the really serious tough cop who doesn't mess around; Pearce is Ed Exley, the self-righteous cop who thinks he can rise above the sleaze in the department. Kevin Spacey also stars as another detective who works with a publisher of a sleazy tabloid played by Danny DeVito. James Cromwell is on hand as the detectives' police captain, and Kim Basinger gives an Oscar-winning performance as Lynn Bracken, the Veronica Lake look-alike call girl who becomes attached to the Crowe character. All these actors are superb here. Director Curtis Hanson does an outstanding job with the way he put this movie together. I was able to follow where this movie was going, and the Oscar-winning adapted screenplay (by Hanson and Brian Helgeland based on James Ellroy's novel) is compelling and brilliantly detailed. The sets and production design is another plus. The movie really looks like 1950s L.A. The cinematography, editing, and music score (by the great Jerry Goldsmith) are all first-rate (not to mention some good old classic songs). I loved everything about "L.A. Confidential". I think it's one of the top 10 best films of the 1990s.

**** (out of four)