A Savory Tragedy

Rating: 10/10 (20 March 2006)

Tim Robbins exudes meekness - the destruction of his soul, as painful as the deteriorated friendship of the three primary characters - once neighborhood friends: boys that do what boys do - a little mischief merging into an instant repeated interminably in the mind of Robbins - married, with son, but utterly lost.
Fate descends so often that it borders on revealing authorship. The writing in the drying cement, Robbins name half carved - later to be revisited - the familial betrayal by the unredeemed killer sons.
Mystic river - the secrets it holds will captivate. As deep as the faithfulness of the Shakespearan wife in strict devotion - and the extreme of the biblical wife - fallen, untrustfull, afraid to the point of absurdity of her broken husband (Robbins).
The film is replete with memorable scenes that won't soon leave one's cinematic mind - the boy abducted in the black "hearse" - the three daughters dancing on the bar, inebriated, naive of the force of men destructed. The blood on Robbins shirt as he returns to his betrayer.
The sinister seduction, of both unmanifested dreams - the unfulfilled dream for the two young lovers to leave Boston, and the deep eddying river that repeats the sins of fathers, relieves the horror of sons discovering the sin of the father - the seduction of Penn's wife, to power, to an unfathomable rage and a sense of just revenge.
The parade ends it. The handshake click of a make-believe gun - the sinner and the broken cop, unwilling to accede to his role in letting Robbins' life become soulless and a brief step away from the swallowing, forgetful Mystic.
This movie is deeply flawed, however. And it's tragic that Eastwood didn't remove the flaw of the boys' confession - so unnecessary and unmotivated. The only "clue" - the Deus Ex Machina that resolves the mystery. An inference can only be made that this flaw was necessary - that it was an homage to Shakespeare, Sartre, or even Eugene O'Neil... But this is a stretch - an irremediable flaw, simply.
But the movie doesn't suffer from it - rather it succeeds on creating tragedy and importing fate into American film, a trait which has been so lacking, given the ethos of self-creation, and free will. Here, instead, the gods intervene, to give up the killer, to punish a man, Robbins, that was more worthy of heaven, and perhaps this was the happy end, to have his sin absolved by the Mystic.
One of the strongest films of the decade. Highly recommended.