Today’s scene that I love comes from my favorite film of all time, 1972’s The Godfather.
In this scene, Kay Adams (Diane Keaton) has moved on and is working as a teacher. Suddenly, Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) shows up. He’s been back from Sicily for a year and he’s working with his father. Michael promises her that the Corleone family is getting out of the rackets. We, of course, know that is never going to happen.
First released in 1979, ….And Justice For All will always be remembered for one scene.
Yell it with me, “YOU’RE OUT OF ORDER! THE WHOLE TRIAL IS OUT OF ORDER! THEY’RE OUT OF ORDER!”
When attorney Arthur Kirkland (Al Pacino) starts screaming in the middle of the courtroom, it’s a cathartic moment. We’ve spent nearly two hours watching as Arthur deals with one insane situation after another. One of Arthur’s partners, Warren (Larry Bryggman), cares more about his car than actually delivering the right documents to a judge. Another of Arthur’s partners, Jay (Jeffrey Tambor), has a nervous breakdown and, after shaving his head, ends up throwing cafeteria plates at people in the courthouse. Arthur has three clients, one of whom is indigent, one of whom is innocent, and one of whom is a wealthy and despised judge (John Forsythe) who has been accused of a rape that Arthur suspects he committed. The system offers no mercy for Arthur’s innocent (or, at the very least, harmless) clients while going out of it’s way to defend the judge. Meanwhile, another judge (Jack Warden), is driven to take suicidal risks, like flying a helicopter until it runs out of fuel and comes down in a nearby harbor. The assistant district attorney (Craig T. Nelson) only cares about his political ambitions and finally, after one incident after another, Arthur snaps. And it’s cathartic because we’re all on the verge of snapping as well.
That final moment, with its signature Al Pacino rant, is such a strong and iconic scene that it’s easy to forget that the film itself is actually rather uneven. The script, by Barry Levinson and Valerie Curtin, owes a good deal to the work of Paddy Chayefsky. Just as Chayefsky often wrote about men being driven mad by institutional failure, ….And Justice For All features character after character snapping when faced with the screwed-up realities of the American justice system. The final “out of order” speech is obviously meant to be this film’s version of Howard Beale’s “I’m as mad as Hell and I’m not going to take it!” speech from Network and, much like George C. Scott in the Chayefsky-written The Hospital, Arthur spends a lot of time talking about what he doesn’t like about his job. The thing that sets ….And Justice For All apart from the best works of Chayefsky is that Levinson, Curtin, and director Norman Jewison all take Arthur Kirkland at his word while one gets the feeling that Chayefsky would have been a bit more willing to call out Arthur on his self-righteousness. Arthur has every right to be angry when Warren forgets to give a judge an important document while Warren is substituting for him in court. At the same time, Arthur is the one who trusted Warren to do it. In the end, the document was not about one of Warren’s client. In fact, Warren knew absolutely nothing about the case or Arthur’s client. The document was about Arthur’s client and Arthur was the one who decided trust someone who had consistently shown himself to not be particularly detailed-orientated. One gets the feeling that Chayefsky would not have let Arthur off the hook as easily as Levinson, Curtin, and Jewison do. Arthur’s perpetual indignation can sometimes be a little hard to take.
It’s a very episodic film. Arthur goes from one crisis to another and sometimes, you do have to wonder if Arthur has ever had any human or legal interactions that haven’t ended with someone either going insane or dying. There’s no gradual build-up to the film’s insanity, it’s right there from the beginning. And while this means the narrative often feels heavy-handed, it also makes that final speech all the more cathartic. It’s an uneven film and, of all of the characters that Pacino played in the 70s, Arthur is probably the least interesting. But that final rant makes up for a lot and, fortunately, Pacino was just the actor to make it memorable. For all it’s flaws, the final few minutes of ….And Justice For All make the film unforgettable.
In 1973’s Serpico, Al Pacino plays a cop who doesn’t look like a cop.
Indeed, that’s kind of the start of Frank Serpico’s problems. He’s a New York cop who doesn’t fit the stereotype. When we see him graduating from the Academy, he’s clean-shaven and wearing a standard patrolman uniform and he definitely looks like a new cop, someone who is young and enthusiastic and eager to keep the streets safe. However, Serpico is an outsider at heart. The rest of the cops have their homes in the suburbs, where they spend all of their time with their cop buddies and where they go also go out of their way not to actually live among the people that they police. Serpico has an apartment in Greenwich Village and, as a plainclothes detective, he dresses like a civilian. He has a beard. He has long hair. He has a succession of girlfriends who don’t have much in common with the stereotypical (and there’s that word again) cop’s wife. Serpico is an outsider and he likes it that way. In a world and a career that demands a certain amount of conformity, Frank Serpico is determined to do things his own way.
However, the real reason why Serpico is distrusted is because he refuses to take bribes. While he’s willing to silently accompany his fellow officers while they collect their payoffs from not only the people that they’re supposed to be arresting but also from the storeowners that they’re meant to be protecting, Serpico refuses to take a cut. Serpico understands that the small, everyday corruption is a way of forcing his silence. The corruption may help the cops to bond as a unit but it also ensures that no one is going to talk. Serpico’s refusal to take part makes him untrustworthy in the eyes of his fellow cops.
Serpico and Bob Blair (Tony Roberts), a politically-connected detective, both turn whistleblower but it turns out that getting people to listen to the truth is not as easy as Serpico thought it would be. The Mayor’s office doesn’t want to deal with the political fallout of a police conspiracy. Serpico finds himself growing more and more paranoid, perhaps with good reason. When words gets out that Serpico has attempted to turn into a whistleblower, his fellow cops start to turn on him and, during a drug bust, Serpico finds himself deserted and in danger.
Serpico opens with its title character being rushed to the hospital after having been shot in the face. This actually happened to the real Serpico as well. What the film leaves out is that hundreds of New York cops showed up at the hospital, offering to donate blood during Serpico’s surgery. That’s left out of the film, which at times can be more than a little heavy-handed in its portrayal of Serpico as an honest cop surrounded by nonstop corruption. Filmed just three years after Serpico testified before New York’s Knapp Commission (which was the five-man panel assigned to investigate police corruption in the city), Serpico the movie can sometimes seem a bit too eager to idealize its title character. (Vincent J. Cannato’s excellent look at the mayorship of John V. Lindsay, The Ungovernable City, presents far more nuanced look at the NYPD corruption scandals of the early 70s and Serpico’s role as a whistleblower.) Director Sidney Lumet later expressed some dissatisfaction with the film and even made other films about police corruption — The Prince of the City, Q & A, Night Falls On Manhattan — that attempted to take a less heavy-handed approach to the subject.
That said, as a film, Serpico works as a thriller and as a portrait of a man who, because he refuses to compromise his ideals, finds himself isolated and paranoid. Al Pacino, fresh from playing the tightly-controlled Michael Corleone in The Godfather, gives an intense, emotional, and charismatic performance as Serpico. (One can see why the image of a bearded, hippie-ish Pacino was so popular in the 1970s.) Sidney Lumet brings the streets of New York to vibrant and dangerous life and he surrounds Pacino with an excellent supporting cast, all of whom bring an authentic grit to their roles. Serpico may not be a totally accurate piece of history but it is a good work of entertainment, one that works as a time capsule of New York in the 70s and as a portrait of bureaucratic corruption. It’s also the film in which Al Pacino announced that he wasn’t just a good character actor. He was also a movie star.
Al Pacino finally won his long overdue Oscar with his excellent performance as Lt. Colonel Frank Slade in SCENT OF A WOMAN. This scene where he’s “just getting warmed up” is a personal favorite and no doubt helped him bring home the gold.
Happy 85th Birthday, Mr. Pacino!
Why not? It is Al Pacino’s birthday, after all!
Today’s scene comes from 2019’s The Irishman. In this scene, Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino) asks a former rival for an endorsement to once again be president of the Teamsters union. Needless to say, things don’t get well. I’m on Hoffa’s side here. Showing up 12 and a half minutes late? Wearing shorts to meeting? Someone is definitely owed an apology.
Once you get over the admittedly jarring de-aging effect, this scene reminds us of what a great actor Al Pacino truly is.
4 Shots From 4 Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!
Today, the Shattered Lens wishes a happy birthday to Al Pacino! It’s time for….
4 Shots From 4 Al Pacino Films
The Godfather (1972, dir by Francis Ford Coppola, DP: Gordon Willis)
The Godfather Part II (1974, dir by Francis Ford Coppola, DP: Gordon Willis)
The Irishman (2019, dir by Martin Scorsese, DP: Rodrigo Prieto)
Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (2019, dir by Quentin Tarantino, DP: Robert Richardson)
In New York City, someone is ritualistically murdering the men who are placing rhyming personal ads in a tabloid newspaper. Assigned to the case is Frank Keller (Al Pacino), an alcoholic burn-out whose wife just left him for another cop. Keller and his partner (John Goodman) decide to go undercover. Frank places a rhyming personal ad of his own and then goes to a restaurant to see who shows up. When Helen Cruger (Ellen Barkin) answers the ad, it leads to a relationship between Frank and Helen. Frank is falling for Helen but what if she’s the murderer?
Sea of Love is a superior thriller, even though it doesn’t really work as a mystery. As soon as you see a certain person’s name in the cast list, you’re going to guess who the killer is because that person is always the killer. Sea of Love isn’t really about the mystery, though. It’s about people looking something that’s missing from their lives and realizing that the world is passing them by. The movie works because of the performances of Al Pacino and Ellen Barkin, cast as two lonely middle-aged people who are desperately looking for some sort of connection. Helen and Frank are both in their 40s and wondering if their current situation is really as good as it’s going to get. The film uses Frank’s fear that Helen could be the killer as a metaphor for the fear that anyone feels when they are first starting to open up to someone. Both Pacino and Barkin give emotionally raw and poignant performances. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Al Pacino look as miserable as he did for the majority of Sea of Love. This was Pacino’s first film role after the disaster of Revolution and the movie’s box office success was revived Pacino’s career and convinced him to give movies a try again.
Director Harold Becker captures the feel of New York at its grittiest and least welcoming and Richard Price’s script is full of priceless dialogue. This is one of the rare films in which everyone has something intelligent or meaningful to say. Featuring a strong supporting cast and career-best performances from Ellen Barkin and Al Pacino, Sea of Love is much more than just another cop film.
“Always be closing!” Alec Baldwin shouts at a group of seedy salesman in 1992’s Glengarry Glen Ross and, as tempting as it can be to be snarky about Alec Baldwin, I have to admit that he delivered that line so well that even I briefly worried about my job and I was just watching the movie!
Baldwin plays Blake, the top salesman at a company that sells worthless real estate to people who are dumb enough or trusting enough to believe what its salesmen tell them about always pursuing their dreams. Murray and Mitch, the never-seen but often-mentioned owners of the company, send Blake to the New York office to try to inspire its salesmen to stop whining about their terrible leads and to actually start selling. Blake inspires through bullying. Coffee isn’t for losers, he hisses. The salesman who makes the most money will win a car. The salesman who makes the second-most money will get a set of steak knives. (Blake even brings the knives with him.) Everyone else will get fired. Blake’s speech and Baldwin’s cameo are justifiably famous. Baldwin is only in the film briefly but he’s unforgettable, whether he’s bragging about how much his watch costs or if he’s holding up a pair of brass balls to tell the salesmen (and they are all men) what they’re lacking. He not only attacks them for not being good at their jobs. He also attacks their masculinity. It’s a totally ludicrous speech but it works because the film is taking place in a ludicrous world, one where desperate men try to appear confident as they sell worthless land.
The only salesman who misses Blake’s speech is Ricky Roma (Al Pacino), who is busy conning a friendly but nervous fellow named James Lingk (Jonathan Pryce) out of his money. Roma is probably the only salesman who could have stood up to Blake and that’s because Roma is the only one who has any confidence. Roma’s on a streak. Roma’s winning that car!
Dave Moss (Ed Harris) isn’t going to win that car. Moss is steak knife bound. Moss is bitter and angry and won’t stop talking about how he’s not being treated with enough respect by Murray and Mitch. When the hated office manager, John Williamson (Kevin Spacey), hands out a bunch of leads, Moss is quick to point out that the leads are worthless. When Williamson refuses to hand out the leads identifying prospective customers for the “Glengarry Heights Development,” Moss tells another salesman, the neurotic and weak-willed George Aaronow (Alan Arkin), that they should break into the office, steal them, and sell them to a competitor. Aaronow isn’t a thief but Moss insists that, just because he listened to Moss talk about it, Aaronow is now legally considered to be an accomplice.
And then there’s Shelley Levene (Jack Lemmon), who used to be the top salseman but who is now a desperate mess, begging people to listen to his pitch and insisting that he’s only hit a temporary dry spell. He has a sick daughter. He needs the job and he needs the money and he needs the good leads. Williamson offers to sell them to Levene but the two men then get caught up in arguing about the specifics.
Welcome to Mamet World. Glengarry Glen Ross is a film adaptation of a David Mamet play so it’s not surprising that the film is about a group of men who can argue about anything. The characters in this film talk a lot and the dialogue is so profane, angry, and desperate that it can be easy to overlook that it’s often very funny as well. Roma is having fun. He loves his job, even when he’s yelling at Williamson for ruining a possible sale. Even when the salesmen come to the office and discover that someone has robbed the place and that they’re now all suspects, they continue to try to outhustle everyone around them. Roma tries to sell Lingk on some worthless land. Aaronow, Levene, and Moss try to sell the cops on their innocence. Williamson tries to sell the salesmen on the idea that he’s a boss who is worthy of respect. They’re all born salesmen, even if some of them aren’t very good at it.
Glengarry Glen Ross is very much a filmed play, dialogue-heavy and largely confined to that office and the restaurant nearby. (Levene does visit one prospective investor at home but it doesn’t reduce the film’s staginess.) Fortunately, the combination of Mamet’s dialogue and the performances of the amazing cast holds our interest. Pacino was nominated for an Oscar for his performance. Jack Lemmon should have been as well. (Lemmon’s tendency to overact works well with Levene’s character.) Alec Baldwin and Kevin Spacey, problematic as they may be for modern audiences, both give outstanding supporting performances. You’ll want to hug Alan Arkin. You’ll want someone to punch Ed Harris. Glengarry Glen Ross holds up as a darkly humorous examination of desperate men.
Though the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences claim that the Oscars honor the best of the year, we all know that there are always worthy films and performances that end up getting overlooked. Sometimes, it’s because the competition too fierce. Sometimes, it’s because the film itself was too controversial. Often, it’s just a case of a film’s quality not being fully recognized until years after its initial released. This series of reviews takes a look at the films and performances that should have been nominated but were, for whatever reason, overlooked. These are the Unnominated.
First released in 1995, Heat is one of the most influential and best-known films of the past 30 years. It also received absolutely zero Oscar nominations.
Maybe we shouldn’t be too surprised that Academy — especially the Academy of the 1990s — didn’t shower the film with nominations. For all of its many strengths, Heat is still a genre piece, an epic three-hour crime film from director Michael Mann. It’s a film about obsessive cops and tightly-wound crooks and it’s based on a made-for-TV movie that Mann directed in the late 80s. While the Academy had given a best picture nomination to The Fugitive just two years before, it still hadn’t fully come around to honoring genre films.
And yet one would think that the film could have at least picked up a nomination for its editing or maybe the sound design that helps to make the film’s signature 8-minute gun battle so unforgettable. (Heat is a film that leaves you feeling as if you’re trapped in the middle of its gunfights, running for cover while the cops and the crooks fire on each other.) The screenplay, featuring the scene where Al Pacino’s intense detective sits down for coffee with Robert De Niro’s career crook, also went unnominated.
Al Pacino was not nominated for playing Vincent Hanna and maybe we shouldn’t be too surprised at that. Pacino yells a lot in this movie. When people talk about Pacino having a reputation for bellowing his lines like a madman, they’re usually thinking about the scene where he confronts a weaselly executive (Hank Azaria) about the affair that he’s having with Charlene (Ashley Judd), the wife of criminal Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer). And yet, I think that Pacino’s performance works in the context of the film and it’s often forgotten that Pacino has quite scenes in Heat as well. Pacino’s intensity provides a contrast to Robert De Niro’s tightly controlled career criminal, Neil McCauley. McCauley has done time in prison and he has no intention of ever going back. But, as he admits during the famous diner scene, being a criminal is the only thing that he knows how to do and it’s also the only thing that he wants to do. (“The action is the juice,” Tom Sizemore says in another scene.) If any two actors deserved a joint Oscar nomination it was Pacino and De Niro. In Heat, they’re the perfect team. Pacino’s flamboyance and De Niro’s tightly-controlled emotions come together to form the heart of the picture.
No one from the film’s supporting cast was nominated either, despite there being a wealth of riches to choose from. Ashley Judd and Val Kilmer come to mind as obvious contenders. Kilmer is amazing in the shoot-out that occurs two hours into the film. Ashley Judd has a killer scene where she helps her husband escape from the police. Beyond Judd and Kilmer, I like the quiet menace of Tom Sizemore’s Michael Cheritto. (Just check out the look he gives to an onlooker who is getting a little bit too curious.) Kevin Gage’s sociopathic Waingro is one of the most loathsome characters to ever show up in a movie. William Fichtner, Jon Voight, Danny Trejo, and Tom Noonan all make a definite impression and add to Michael Mann’s portrait of the Los Angeles underworld. In an early role, Natalie Portman plays Hanna’s neglected stepdaughter and even Amy Brenneman has some good moments as Neil’s unsuspecting girlfriend, the one who Neil claims to be prepared to abandon if he sees “the heat coming.”
I have to mention the performance of Dennis Haysbert as Don Breedan, a man who has just been released from prison and who finds himself working as a cook in a diner. (The owner of the diner is played by Bud Cort.) Haysbert doesn’t have many scenes but he gives a poignant performance as a man struggling not to fall back into his old life of crime and what eventually happens to him still packs an emotional punch. For much of the film’s running time, he’s on the fringes of the story. It’s only by chance that he finds himself suddenly and briefly thrown into the middle of the action.
Heat is the ultimate Michael Mann film, a 3-hour crime epic that is full of amazing action sequences, powerful performances, and a moody atmosphere that leaves the viewer with no doubt that the film is actually about a lot more than just a bunch of crooks and the cops who try to stop them. Hanna and McCauley both live by their own code and are equally obsessed with their work. Their showdown is inevitable and, as directed by Michael Mann, it takes on almost mythological grandeur. The film is a portrait of uncertainty and fear in Los Angeles but it’s also a portrait of two men destined to confront each other. They’re both the best at what they do and, as a result, only one can remain alive at the end of the film.
I rewatched Heat yesterday and I was amazed at how well the film holds up. It’s one of the best-paced three-hour films that I’ve ever seen and that epic gunfight is still powerful and frightening to watch. Like Martin Scorsese’s Casino, it was a 1995 film that deserved more Oscar attention than it received.
Heat (1995, dir by Michael Mann, DP: Dante Spinotti)
Previous entries in The Unnominated:
Through the Shattered Lens 