“Jerry, I’m not a nice person. I’m a mean, selfish son-of-a-bitch. I know you want a story, but I want a killer and what I want comes first!”
— Detective Leo Kessler (Charles Bronson) in Ten To Midnight (1983)
At first, Detective Leo Kessler seems like exactly the type of cop that you would expect to find in a film about a serial killer who knows how to manipulate the system to his advantage. Kessler is tough, plain-spoken, a blue collar warrior who is trying to keep the streets of Los Angeles safe for citizens of every age.
“I remember when the legal meant lawful,” Kessler says, “Now, it means loophole.”
Kessler isn’t thrilled that his new partner, Paul McAnn (Andrew Stevens), is a graduate of Berkley and that he’s got a degree in sociology. Kessler’s doubts are actually justified. One of the first things that McAnn does is drop a wad of chewing gum on the ground at a crime scene. Kessler also knows that Warren Stacy (Gene Davis) is the psycho who has been targeting young women and making obscene phone calls to his daughter, Laurie (Lisa Eilbacher). When McAnn discovers that Kessler has planted blood evidence on Warren’s clothes, McAnn is torn about what to do. “Forget what’s legal,” Kessler says, “and do what’s right.”
But here’s the thing with Kessler. He may say that he’s a mean son of a bitch but he’s not. He’s actually a pretty nice guy. He even discovers that he likes and becomes a mentor to McAnn. Kessler just doesn’t think that someone like Warren Stacy should be wandering around, free to kill. Charles Bronson never gets nearly enough credit for his acting. Leo Kessler isn’t just a touch cop. He’s an old-fashioned guy in a changing world. He’s someone who doesn’t understand why the system is suddenly more worried about the Warrn Stacys of the world than the victims.
He’s also a father.
Leo: “I hate quiche.”
Laurie: “Why did you get it?”
Leo: “I thought it was pie.”
As violent and exploitive as From 10 To Midnight is, I have to admit that I have a sentimental attachment to the film. The difficult-but-loving relationship between Leo and Laurie Kessler reminds me of my own relationship with my Dad. I see a lot of my Dad in Leo and I also see a lot of myself in Laurie. There’s a scene early on where McAnn mentions to Laurie that she’s a lot like her father.
“You think so?” Laurie replies, “I don’t.”
That scene gets me every time because I’ve had people say the same thing to me about my Dad and I used to have the same response. Everyone else picked up on it long before I realized it. For all of Laurie complaints about Leo having always been too busy for her, she’s there to comfort him after he gets kicked off the force. “I’m getting drunk with my old man,” Laurie says. Leo replies that she’s not.
It’s rare to see Charles Bronson cast as a family man. Usually, he played loners, the type of solitary warriors who seemed to have nothing in their lives beyond doing accomplishing whatever their mission happened to be. The Death Wish films did give Bronson a family but they were all dead by the end of the second film. 10 To Midnight features Bronson as not just a tough cop but also Bronson as a father with an independent and intelligent daughter. I think that’s the main reason why 10 to Midnight is my favorite Bronson films.
“No, we won’t.”
— Detective Leo Kessler
Bronson only fires his gun once in 10 To Midnight but he definitely makes a statement with that shot. And after spending 101 minutes watching Kessler trying to stop Warren Stacy, there’s definitely something very cathartic about the simple brutality of the film’s ending. Trying to analyze or understand evil, the film tells us, is pointless.
Sometimes, you just need someone who is willing to say, “No, we won’t.”
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