Missed The Target

Rating: 6/10 (12 January 2006)

If a person ever has the misfortune to be stuck in a room with a script writing teacher who bangs on about Aristotle's Poetics and generally tows that line, Mystic River is a film that will be something not forgotten. A perfect Aristotelian tragedy is clearly the kind of film Eastwood wished to make but on a plot level, but nevertheless falls short.
The flaws begin with the case of the poorly written wives. The Celeste Boyle character (Marcia Gay Harden) is never properly explored. She all too quickly embodies the audience's suspicions to the point where it has to be asked whether she has only been married to him as long as we have known her. She has no motive to jump to that conclusion so quickly - other than her conscience - and since when is that good enough in a story like this? The audience jumps to that conclusion because we don't know him - she's his wife and the mother of his child. Annabeth Markum (Laura Linney) becomes Lady MacBeth hailing a king in the final act while remaining pretty much absent throughout much of the film including her daughter's wake. Cop Sean Devine's (Kevin Bacon) relationship to his prank caller wife is never explained to any purposeful degree but by the end of the film he's playing happy families with her and a new born baby.
Within the main trio of characters, Dave Boyle's reasons for not coming clean about his "mugging" are also pretty thin. Sean Devine's (Kevin Bacon) story is also never explored to the point where he serves as a device for tension but not someone whose fate we really care about. Not to mind the fact that at the end of the film he shows up with all the answers, but does nothing to apprehend a killer. Yet somehow is rewarded with domestic bliss. Obviously, moral questions abound about arresting a man and friend whose daughter has just been killed and who has falsely accused and killed one of his oldest friends. Nevertheless, it was Jimmy Markcum's (Sean Penn) character who was arguably the focus of this film. He was the leader of the kids when they wrote in the cement and had Dave Boyle kidnapped and raped. He shows no remorse for this indirect responsibility and carries no guilt - which is perhaps understandable. Nevertheless, it is his actions which set off this tragedy - and it is he who must fall to bring about the true catharsis.
We know right from the start of looking at this kid that he is a punk and he will always be a punk. As soon as we know it's his daughter that has died, we know somebody is going to die, and we also know that that somebody is going to be Dave Boyle. The only thing open to question in this film, is Jimmy Marcum's moral journey. He is wound up like a pit bull from the start to the finish, his tragic flaw being his over zealous love for his daughter and his need for revenge and it must be this which brings about his downfall and creates the catharsis of the film. It is his arrest and the total destruction of his family - that fall of the king - which brings about the moral wrenching which we needed to feel the full impact of this story. Instead, we end up with random marching parades, the return of the wife and child of a supporting character for no real dramatic effect, and some funny glances with an open ending. Most of all there is no justice for Marcum which is what this story demands. A Tragedy where the tragic hero doesn't fall. Tragedy's with a happy ending does not a masterpiece make.
Nevertheless, it has to be said, the acting here is flawless. What's missing in the perfect Aristotelian or Shakespearian plot is made up for in this powerful cast. It is only when a film is this well crafted that one can see so perfectly just where all it's flaws lie. Clearly this film has worked well enough to get Oscars and garner rave reviews, but it simply isn't the film it should have been.