Textbook greatness!

Rating: Null/10 (4 April 2001)

Author James Ellroy published his "L.A. Confidential" as the third (but not final) part of his "L.A. Trilogy," a series of four (that's where he wound up) increasingly dark, frightening, savagely cynical and brutal novels. In it, he interwove fictionalized accounts of actual events (i.e., the Christmas Eve Massacre, the Night Owl murders, the chain of gang murders arising out of the Cohen-Dragna wars), thinly disguised portrayals of actual people (Walt Disney as the most singular example) and a trio of protagonists, each of whom was equally corrupt in his own way. Ellroy also lost control of his material before he was finished. Too many subplots and counterplots culminating in a truly comic book climax.
So how do you adapt that novel to the screen while simultaneously changing key elements (including the ending), somehow turning a real downer of a message into an affirmation, yet emerge with a result that is not only true to the novel but REDEEMS it? Put Messrs. Hansen and Helgeland to work on the screenplay, assemble the finest ensemble cast of actors to grace a project in the last thirty years, set Hansen to direct it with pitch-perfect attention to pacing, mood and nuance, and you've got a pretty good chance of success. (Even Ellroy reportedly liked the result, but then he's mellowed over the years.)
No one was going to pick up a Best Actor nomination in this film (they were all too good), but next time you watch it, check out Kevin Spacey a little more closely: Beyond the flash and the swagger of Jack Vincennes, catch the glint of self-loathing that peeps out from the corner of his eyes, even in his most cynical moments. Or the reaction that tells you, in the midst of that jail fight, he's angriest at the way blood got splattered on his tailored white shirt. For that matter, watch Spacey when he's not the main focal point of a scene; textbook acting in a rolling textbook of superb filmmaking.
Hansen manages to almost perfectly evoke the feel and the pace of early 50s L.A. (I was there) and, by extension, the rest of the nation, a time when titillation and indignation rubbed shoulders a lot more intimately than either liked to admit, a world that was chomping at the bit to go mad (backyard bomb shelters and that ol' "devil music rock & roll" were already on the horizon). It was a society that was growing uneasy with itself and scared of the enemy outside, one that was desperate for the placebos of "Dragnet," even though the truth was a lot closer to . . . L.A. Confidential.