MGM MOD DVD of the Week: Defiance / Patty Hearst

Defiance (1980) is an early Jerry Bruckheimer production, back when he was interested in making gritty crime films like American Gigolo (1980) and Thief (1981). Unfortunately, Defiance was given a limited released where it promptly bombed at the box office and failed to connect with a mainstream audience, relegating it to late night cable television. MGM has recently resurrected the film and finally given it a DVD release with the Movies On Demand program.

Tom “Tommy” Gamble (Jan Michael Vincent) is a tough merchant seaman who finds himself suspended with a six-month stay in New York City until he can get another job at sea. Broke and bummed at having to spend all this time in a city he can’t stand the sight of, he walks the dirty streets to the strains of “Bad Times” by Gerard McMahon (one of seven he wrote and performed for the film), which tries to capture the blue collar aesthetic of Bruce Springsteen but to a funk beat. He’s closer to Eddie and the Cruisers (1983) than Springsteen, however. A bartender that Tommy knows hooks him up with an apartment to crash in and it has all the slummy allure of a cesspool.

He spends his spare time (of which he has plenty) learning Spanish in the hopes of getting a ship bound for Panama. Despite his best efforts to keep to himself, Tommy befriends his chatty neighbor upstairs, Marsha Bernstein (Theresa Saldana), his noisy next-door neighbor Carmine (Danny Aiello), Abe (Art Carney), the savvy local shopkeeper, and a snotty-nosed street urchin (Fernando Lopez). This cozy collection of ethnic stereotypes are being harassed by a street gang populated by rejects who didn’t make the cut in The Warriors (1979) and led by the silent but deadly Angel Cruz (Rudy Ramos). Even though Tommy makes it clear that he wants to be left alone, the gang roughs him up (they take his art supplies!) and terrorizes the neighborhood (for kicks they throw bottles and cans at a street cleaning vehicle and disrupt a bingo game which is pretty innocuous on the deviant scale) until the merchant seaman reaches his breaking point and opens up a can of whoop-ass on these punks.

Defiance is the kind of urban revenge film that Cannon Films would have made in the 1980’s, probably starring Charles Bronson, complete with a xenophobic view of the big city. Instead we get Jan Michael Vincent, fresh from his iconic role in the Big Wednesday (1978). With his lean, chiseled features, he is well cast as the decent man who is pushed too close to the edge. As envisioned by the actor, Tommy is a tough guy but underneath is a real softy as the charm of the tenants in his building – in particular, Marsha and the kid – eventually break through his gruff exterior. Danny Aiello appears in an early role as a genial local bringing his own unique brand of charm to the role as only he can. Art Carney is slumming it as a stereotypical storeowner. Look closely and you’ll see Tony Sirico (Paulie from The Sopranos) in an early role and Lenny Montana (Luca Brasi from The Godfather) in small but memorable roles as respectable members of the neighborhood.

Director John Flynn orchestrates everything with his trademark no frills style that wouldn’t look out of place on an episode of Hill Street Blues. It is the kind of meat and potatoes filmmaking that is ideally suited for Defiance. Let’s be honest, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how the story is going to end but that’s neither here nor there. The purpose of this film is to tell a simple yet entertaining story.

 

Coming off the commercial and critical failure that was Light of Day (1987), Paul Schrader went on to direct Patty Hearst (1988), a low budget docudrama about the kidnapping of Patricia Hearst by the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) in 1974. Based on her 1982 autobiography Every Secret Thing, the film is a gritty account of how the SLA attempted to brainwash the newspaper heiress and force her to rob a bank and become a revolutionary. The film made its debut at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival but was given a very modest release and pretty much dropped off of everyone’s radar soon afterwards. It has finally been given a Region 1 DVD release thanks to the MGM MOD program, which restores the original aspect ratio and features a fine transfer.


Schrader wastes no time in showing the Hearst kidnapping and in doing so doesn’t spend much time establishing who she is or letting us get to know her, which makes it a little hard, initially, to empathize with her plight. He proceeds to show the relentless indoctrination the SLA did on Hearst – keeping her in a closet, opening the door occasionally to spout chunks of their radical left-wing manifesto. The tag-team of sensory deprivation and being force-fed SLA dogma wears down her defenses. Schrader shoots these scenes in shadowy rooms with distorted lenses and skewed shots accompanied by creepy, atmospheric music that evokes the claustrophobic feeling of a horror film.

Natasha Richardson does a good job of conveying the gradual breaking down of Hearst’s mental state to the point where she would be receptive to the SLA’s propaganda. The actress not only looks physically haggard but you can see it in her eyes – that glazed look of desperation. Richardson also captures the pampered softness of a woman born with a silver spoon in the mouth – the granddaughter of publishing tycoon William Randolph Hearst. If we didn’t sympathize with her early on then we do while watching her get brainwashed. This innocent, young woman is bullied and treated like a prisoner of war. They get her to the point where she wants to join their cause and has no problem regurgitating their beliefs. In addition to Richardson, Schrader assembled an interesting cast of character actors to play SLA members: Ving Rhames as their militant leader, William Forsythe as a guy who wishes he was black and also Dana Delany and Frances Fisher.

With the rise of domestic terrorism in the last ten years, Patty Hearst remains eerily relevant. By the end of the film she goes from being programmed by the SLA to being programmed by doctors, lawyers and medical experts. For a low budget film, Schrader gives it a slick, cinematic look. The locations are sparse with no pretty details, just stark by design. This is contrasted with stylish lighting and color schemes. The film’s focus is on Hearst and the insular world of the SLA, which makes sense as the outside world’s reaction to what happened is well-documented. This is Hearst’s story told mostly from her perspective. Is she merely a spoiled rich brat or brainwashed revolutionary? Patty Hearst makes a case for both and leaves it up to the viewer to make up their own mind.

 

Ronin

Most big budget spy films are often cartoonish action fare with an emphasis on spectacle (explosions, gunfights and car chases) and very little intelligence or interesting characters. Aside from the smart, visceral Jason Bourne films, the only mainstream film to credibly mix brains and brawn in the last fifteen years has been Ronin (1998). This is due in large part to the efficient direction of veteran filmmaker John Frankenheimer, a lean, no-nonsense screenplay written by J. D. Zeik and by David Mamet (under the guise of Richard Weisz) and a solid cast featuring the likes of Robert De Niro, Jean Reno, Stellan Skarsgard, and Sean Bean.

The set-up is this: a group of mercenaries from all over the world assemble in France and are given a mission to steal a briefcase with unknown but what they believe to be very valuable contents inside. The group consists of an American driving expert named Larry (Skipp Sudduth); Spence (Sean Bean), a British weapons man; Gregor (Stellan Skarsgard), an ex-KGB computer expert; Vincent (Jean Reno), a French equipment man; and Sam (Robert De Niro), a veteran tactician from America. They are in turn briefed by a mysterious Irish woman named Deirdre (Natascha McElhone) who we later learn gets her information from a fellow IRA operative, Seamus O’Rourke (Jonathan Pryce).

Because they are all doing this for money no one trusts each other and there is palpable tension under a façade of bravado, dry humor and professional respect. This is exemplified by great one-liners, like when Spence asks Sam, “You ever kill anybody?” to which he responds dismissively, “I hurt somebody’s feelings once.” I love the scene early on where the newly assembled team sniffs each other out. This is where Mamet’s dialogue shines as the various personalities of the team surface: Spence is the cocky Brit; Sam is the sarcastically evasive American; Vincent is the quietly confident Frenchman; and Gregor is the no-nonsense ex-KGB man.

The first action sequence involves a gun deal that goes sour. What stands out in this scene more than the superbly staged action are the little details, like the look on Sam and Vincent’s faces when they realize that they’re walking into a set-up. Afterwards, Vincent thanks Sam for protecting him and a bond develops between the two men that comes from surviving intense, life and death situations. Their relationship is well-played by the two-actors. I also like that Frankenheimer takes the time to show Sam and his team discussing the plan to steal the case. They talk about tactics and, at one point, Sam and Deirdre scout the target and the team protecting it in order to get an idea of the exact number of opponents, how skilled they are and so on. We see just how clever and experienced Sam is in this scene. We also see that a lot preparation goes into a job like this and one can never be too prepared, especially when they are not given all the information.

The group gets the case but one of their own betrays them and takes off with it. This kick-starts a thrilling cat and mouse game through the streets of Paris as Frankenheimer orchestrates action sequences with the kind of ruthless efficiency that would make Michael Mann green with envy. For the most part, they are realistically depicted. Nobody wastes hundreds of rounds before reloading, the actual battles don’t last long, and innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire are killed. Ronin was justly praised for its very exciting car chase sequences. No laws of physics are grossly violated as these guys pursue each other in and around the narrow streets of Nice or through the streets of Paris. You can tell that actual stuntmen drove these cars at high speeds and they were actually crashed, not done later with computer graphics. These sequences work so well not just because they are exciting, well shot and edited, but because they are just as important to the narrative of the film as everything else. They have a purpose as opposed to many other action films where car chases are used as filler to distract the audience from the lack of story, character and so on. It should also be pointed out how cleanly executed these scenes are with refreshingly fluid camera movements so that you get an idea of what his going on and where. There is a nice lack of disorienting hand-held camerawork and these sequences are not hacked to pieces with frenetic editing but done in a way that conveys speed and urgency.

Ronin is also refreshingly free of simple good guy/bad guy roles. They don’t exist in this world because all of the characters are imbued with both of these qualities. For them, this job is strictly business and when it becomes personal that is when mistakes are made. Robert De Niro turns in his last truly great performance to date as the experienced soldier-of-fortune. Like his character in Heat (1995), he’s all business and dedicated to the job at hand and nothing else. He’s ably supported by the always watchable Jean Reno as the steadying hand of the group. He plays the reliable guy so well and exudes a quiet dignity that is fascinating to watch. Frankenheimer wisely plays up the mutual respect between De Niro and Reno’s characters. One wishes that by the film’s conclusion these guys would do another project together, especially as the characters in Ronin.

David Mamet’s lean script reflects the characters it depicts. These are professional soldiers who don’t have time to waste on idle chit-chat. They have been hired to do a job and do it well – that’s what they’re getting paid for. His screenplay also provides a window into the post-Cold War espionage world (as he would also do later on with Spartan). It’s an open market with all sorts of ex-soldiers from all over the world selling their services to the highest bidder. After all, what do career soldiers do in between wars? Mamet only hints at this early on when Vincent laments to Sam about their profession, “Seven fat years and seven lean years.” The “fat years” would seem to refer to the time when these guys were employed by their respective governments and enjoyed all kinds of perks. Now they are in the “lean years” doing jobs purely for money. This exchange also establishes early on the bond that begins to form between these two veteran warriors.

At the heart of Ronin is an intriguing discussion between Sam and Jean Pierre (Michael Lonsdale), Vincent’s former boss and the man who tends to a gunshot wound Sam receives in a skirmish. While resting from impromptu surgery to remove the bullet, Jean Pierre relates to Sam the story of the 47 samurai and the Warrior Code:

“The Forty Seven Ronin, do you know it? Forty-seven samurai whose master was betrayed and killed by another lord. They became ronin, masterless samurai, disgraced by another man’s treachery. For three years they plotted, pretending to be thieves, mercenaries, even madmen (that I didn’t have time to do). And then one night they struck, slipping into the castle of their lord’s betrayer, killing him … The warrior code, the delight in the battle. You understand that, yes? But also something more. You understand there is something outside yourself that has to be served. And when that need is gone, when belief has died, what are you? A man without a master.”

Sam speaks of surviving to retirement even though most of his friends have died before they could achieve it because in their line of work longevity is a rarity, eventually everyone’s luck runs. It’s a topic Mamet would explore in greater detail in films like Spartan (2004), Red Belt (2008), and the television show The Unit.

In 1997, president of United Artists Lindsay Doran met with director John Frankenheimer about a project shortly after she received the screenplay for Ronin. She was a big fan of his films and felt that Ronin was perfectly suited for him: “I’m a supporter of the idea of hiring people who have practically been forgotten. There are an awful lot of filmmakers who stop getting hired when they’re 60 or 55 or even 50.” When Frankenheimer read the script it reminded him of action films from the 1960’s and 1970’s: “What appealed to me too was that it was an intelligent suspense thriller. At heart it’s a film that questions our ethics and the meaning of honor and what it means to ‘do one’s job.’” Doran and United Artists decided to hire Frankenheimer based on his work on Andersonville (1996), television miniseries for TNT in which he won an Emmy for direction.

In terms of camerawork, Frankenheimer eschewed a stylized approach to create what he called a “heightened reality” and achieved this with wide angles and a depth of field. The director hired French cinematographer Robert Fraisse based on his work on the HBO film Citizen X (1995): “I saw that Robert knew how to work within the confines of a schedule, and knew the demands of an American production.” Ronin was shot in a brisk 78 days with an additional 30 days of second-unit work done by Frankenheimer and Fraisse.

For the three car chase sequences, Frankenheimer employed the same techniques he utilized on Grand Prix (1966). According to one of the film’s stunt coordinators and professional race car driver Jean-Claude Lagniez, 150 drivers were used with cars going as fast as 120 miles per hour. Approximately 80 cars were wrecked in scenes where whole sections of Nice and roadways in Paris were temporarily closed down. He and Michael Neugarten were among the drivers hired to do the stunt driving. The director had clearly done his research as both men had won their respective categories at Le Mans the year before. Lagniez said that Frankenheimer insisted the cars during the chases travel at full speed: “If I’m going to do a car chase, I’m going to do a car chase that’s going to make somebody think about whether or not they want to do another one!” The director did some shots with the actors in real cars by using English right-hand drive vehicles. The stunt driver would be actually driving the car and a fake steering wheel on the left would be for the actor. This allowed Frankenheimer to photograph the actors “driving” the cars. The director storyboarded all three chase sequences, generating hundreds of drawings that were used as a guide on location, allowing him to improvise at a given moment if he were so inclined.

A minor controversy broke out brief over screenwriting credit. J.D. Zeik wrote the original script and then David Mamet was brought in to either do a bit of script doctoring or rewrite it completely, depending on who you believe. Frankenheimer claims the latter as he said an interview, “We didn’t shoot a line of Zeik’s script.” Zeik’s attorney claimed that Mamet was brought in at the last minute before principal photography to “beef up De Niro’s role,” added Deirdre as a love interest for Sam and rewrote several scenes. The lawyer claimed that rather than give his client – a then-up and coming screenwriter – sole credit Mamet included his name in order to receive greater residuals. Zeik’s attorney appealed to Mamet’s lawyer to let his client have sole credit but was rebuffed. Mamet tried to apply for sole writing credit but the Writer’s Guild ruled that credit should be given to both Zeik and Mamet. Already burned by the WGA over credit for Wag the Dog (1997), and in protest, Mamet used the pseudonym of Richard Weisz on Ronin. Furthermore, Zeik’s lawyer then accused Frankenheimer of dropping his client “to curry favor with David Mamet.”

Ronin received mixed reviews from critics at the time. Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars and praised Frankenheimer’s handling of the material: “Here, with a fine cast, he does what is essentially an entertaining exercise. The movie is not really about anything; if it were, it might have really amounted to something, since it comes pretty close anyway.” In her review for The New York Times, Janet Maslin raved about the film’s car chases: “Proving that the greatest excitement an action film can offer is the spectacle of real derring-do performed by real people, Mr. Frankenheimer stages three sensational French chase sequences in settings that prove astonishing, under the circumstances … these scenes are nothing short of sensational. Mr. Frankenheimer directs them in fast, efficient, no-frills fashion because no extra frills are needed.” Time magazine’s Richard Schickel wrote, “Unvexed by boring details, which usually just compound the implausibility of action movies anyway, we are free to appreciate the sheer stylishness of Ronin. This derives from the counterpoint between Mamet's verbal manner—weary, knowing, elliptical—and director John Frankenheimer's bold visual manner.”

However, Entertainment Weekly gave the film a “B-“ rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, “I wish Frankenheimer had done more with Stellan Skarsgard's icy genius sociopath. Ronin is ''well-crafted,'' but it's also empty — a joyless thrill ride … In a movie like this one, speed itself starts out as excitement and ends as desperation — as a race out of the void.” In his review for the Washington Post, Michael O’Sullivan wasn’t nearly as taken with the film: “Despite some ingenious touches, as when Sam and Deirdre pose as tourists to snap photos of their elusive quarry, much of the time Ronin feels like a high-brow Steven Seagal film, with massive gun battles that casually disregard civilian casualties and too many overlong car chases through the twisty streets of Paris and Nice.” New York magazine’s David Denby concurred: “Ronin is well-made, but it's an act of connoisseurship for people who have given up on movies as an art form.”

Frankenheimer and Mamet created a fascinating world of international mercenaries that at once seems realistic and also very cinematic in nature with its exciting car chases and gun battles. The director brought years of experience as an excellent journeyman director to Ronin. He didn’t waste time with needless exposition and showy style. Like the characters in the film, he’s there to get the job done while also delivering an entertaining movie, harkening back to his Classic Hollywood contemporaries like Don Siegel. Ronin would be one of Frankenheimer’s last films (the less said about Reindeer Games the better) and it is a fitting swan song for the man who unfortunately died in 2002.

SOURCES

Harrison, Eric. “Mamet Versus Writers Guild, the Action Thriller Sequel.” Los Angeles Times. August 5, 1988.

Magid, Robert. “Samurai Tactics.” American Cinematographer. October 1998.

Ronin Production Notes. 1998.

Sterngold, James. “At the Movies: High-Speed Espionage.” The New York Times. September 11, 1998.

Weinraub, Bernard. “Thriving on an Atmosphere of No Illusions.” The New York Times. September 13, 1998.

DVD of the Week: Drive Angry

Continuing his string of paycheck movies, Drive Angry (2011) is actually closer to the gonzo Nicolas Cage of old than the diluted actor we’ve come to expect in films like Next (2007) and Knowing (2009). With Drive Angry, he’s made a full-on, balls-out cult film that flopped spectacularly at the box office and was trashed by the critics. It has all the necessary ingredients of cult status: loads of ultra violence, nudity, lots of cussing, and all kinds of character actors chewing up the scenery. The film is the brainchild of Patrick Lussier and Todd Farmer, the former a B-horror director responsible for efforts like Dracula III: Legacy (2005) and My Bloody Valentine 3D (2009). While the latter film was an unnecessary remake of the 1980’s Canadian slasher film of the same name, it did hint at the garish excesses Lussier was capable of and has finally delivered with Drive Angry.


The film begins with John Milton (Nicolas Cage) literally escaping from hell in a badass muscle car. He is trying to avenge his daughter’s murder and rescue her kidnapped baby from Jonah King (Billy Burke), the sadistic leader of a satanic cult. In the first five minutes, Milton totals a pick-up truck with three flunkies in a way that is so gloriously and stylishly over-the-top that it would make Robert Rodriguez green with envy. While his film, Machete (2010), paid homage to exploitation films, Drive Angry is one, only with A-list talent. Milton crosses paths with Piper (Amber Heard), a tough ex-waitress who has recently broken up with her deadbeat boyfriend (Todd Farmer in a cameo). Hot on their trail is a man known only as the Accountant (William Fichtner), a dapper minion from Hell come to bring Milton back.

Inspired by another cartoonish action film, Shoot ‘Em Up (2007), Drive Angry also features a gun battle while the protagonist is having sex only captured in slow motion and cheekily scored to “You Want the Candy” by the Raveonettes. While excessively violent and gory, the action sequences are all so overtly stylish that they can’t be taken too seriously. This film is akin to a blood-drenched, R-rated cartoon. The violence isn’t cruel and mean-spirited like in a torture porn horror film, but rather gleefully petulant like the guys who orchestrated all of this mayhem grew up reading Fangoria in the ‘80s.

Surrounded by all of this garish style and crazed violence, Nicolas Cage wisely underplays his role, going for the calm, collected man of action. He’s matched up perfectly with the always watchable William Fichtner who seems to be channeling Christopher Walken with his wonderfully eccentric performance. He looks to be having an absolute blast with this role and steals every scene he’s in with his unfailingly polite yet very lethal character. Billy Burke is suitably sinister as a religious fanatic and the beautiful Amber Heard holds her own as a two-fisted, curse-like-a-sailor sidekick to Cage’s undead avenger. David Morse even shows up using his considerable skill as an actor to make a chunk of exposition dialogue palatable.

Drive Angry has everything you could want from a trashy action film: cool muscle cars, over-the-top shoot-outs, larger than life baddies, and a cool good guy with a mission. All of this is handled ably by Lussier in what is easily his most accomplished film to date. He gleefully sticks a middle finger in the face of political correctness with a film that is more entertaining than it had any right to be. Cage needs to do more films like this and Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009), which harken back to the eccentric characters he played early on in his career.

Special Features:

There is an audio commentary by director Patrick Lussier and co-screenwriter Todd Farmer. Lussier jokingly refers to Drive Angry as his “subtle, gentle road movie,” and battles through a bad case of laryngitis, which makes it difficult, at times, to understand what he’s trying to say. But he soldiers on with Farmer as they talk about how the film was made. The two men tell all kinds of filming anecdotes as they talk us through filming. Lussier points out that Clint Eastwood’s protagonist in High Plains Drifter (1973) was the model for Cage’s character. They give shout-outs to various crew members’ contributions on this solid track.

“How To: Drive Angry” is one of the better promotional featurettes. Amazingly, the studio gave the filmmakers the creative freedom to do a hard R-rated supernatural action film. They talk about shooting in 3D as opposed to converting it in post-production. The filmmakers also talk about working with a modest budget and solving certain problems creatively as opposed to throwing a lot of money at it a la Michael Bay. It’s nice to see that many of the stunts in the film were done practically.

“Milton’s Mayhem” is an amusing extra that compiles all of Milton’s action sequences and attributes a point system to every punch and gunshot like something out of a video game.

Finally, there are two deleted scenes with optional commentary by Lussier and Farmer. We see a little more with Piper and her boyfriend and another scene with the Accountant that were both rightly cut.

The Indian Runner

“My name is Joe Roberts, I work for the state
I'm a sergeant out of Perrineville, barracks number 8
I always done an honest job, as honest as I could
I got a brother named Franky, and Franky ain't no good”
- “Highway Patrolman” by Bruce Springsteen

The Indian Runner marked Sean Penn’s directorial debut in 1991 and was based on the Bruce Springsteen song “Highway Patrolman” from his 1982 album Nebraska. Like the song, the film is a character study that focuses on the turbulent relationship between two brothers – one a police officer, the other a troubled Vietnam War veteran. Penn proceeds to take Springsteen’s song and flesh it out to create an engrossing film that evokes some of the best American films from the 1970’s. It also gave substantial roles to then up-and-coming character actors David Morse and Viggo Mortensen while also giving juicy supporting parts to veterans like Charles Bronson and Dennis Hopper. While The Indian Runner was a critical darling, playing the film festival circuit, it failed to catch on with a mainstream audience due to its dark subject matter.

The film begins with a car chase through snow-swept countryside and the first thing that one notices is the shots of the desolate farmland – a close-up of barbed wire, a No Hunting sign written on a spare tire – that Penn inserts throughout the chase. With this sequence he not only establishes Joe Roberts (David Morse), a highway patrolman and one of the main characters, but the setting – America’s heartland. Joe’s estranged brother Frank (Viggo Mortensen) is due to return from Vietnam in a week but he arrives unexpectedly early in the middle of the night. Joe is determined to put Frank on the straight and narrow path and repair their fractured relationship. At first, things go smoothly as Frank attempts to emulate his brother by getting involved with a woman (Patricia Arquette) who ends up pregnant with his child but he can’t change who he is and Joe is forced to choose between his duty as a cop and his love for Frank.

As you would expect from an actor turned director, The Indian Runner is an excellent showcase for the actors. Penn gets solid performances out of every one with David Morse and Viggo Mortensen delivering career defining performances. Mortensen is something of a minor revelation here as he effortlessly disappears into the troubled Frank and one can see a simmering rage behind his eyes. He is the unpredictable bad boy who, if he hadn’t gone to Vietnam, probably would’ve gone to prison (which is what happens when he gets back). This is in sharp contrast to Morse’s Joe, an upstanding officer of the law who took on the profession after his farm went out of business. He’s now married and has a kid – all the hallmarks of a “good man” as his mother (Sandy Dennis) puts it, which is the polar opposite of Frank who is “a very restless boy” as his father (Charles Bronson) puts it. Morse and Mortensen are the kind of actors that would have thrived in the ‘70s and one could easily see them in films like Five Easy Pieces (1970) or Scarecrow (1973). Penn’s film is obviously attempting to evoke films from that era, like The Deer Hunter (1978), which weren’t afraid to present flawed characters and stories that were driven by them with attention to their behavior. It makes sense, then, that Penn dedicates his film to the memory of Hal Ashby and John Cassavetes – two maverick filmmakers who helped define the kind of challenging films Penn admires and emulates from that decade. Yet, he isn’t merely evoking that era of filmmaking to be hip. He incorporates it into his film and makes it his own.

Morse has the tougher job of playing the responsible brother, which tends to be the less showy role in films like this but the actor brings a quiet dignity to the part. Joe is a decent man who loves his family but feels guilt about his inability to reform his brother. Morse has an easygoing charm, which he infuses in Joe who in turn uses it to disarm tension in certain scenes. The actor does get his moments, like when he surveys the bloody mess of a crime scene where the victim has committed suicide. Morse doesn’t say anything as his eyes do all the talking as he stares at his fingers covered in the victim’s blood. Morse conveys his feelings through his kind, expressive eyes while Mortensen internalizes everything behind his cold and distant ones.

It has been said by film critics like Roger Ebert that Frank and Joe reflect the duality that exists in Sean Penn. There is the respectable, socially-conscious family man that was married with kids, and the rebellious hellraiser that punches out paparazzi. Mortensen even adopts a drawl coupled with a sly grin as he smokes a cigarette in several scenes that, at times, evokes Penn. This may explain why Frank and Joe seem so authentic as Penn knows these people so well. It also helps that his casting is spot on. He rescued Charles Bronson from generic thriller hell and cast him in this film. It is great to see the veteran actor in a substantial role as he brings an impressive complexity to a bitter father figure proud of one son and disappointed in another. In his small amount of screen-time he manages to convey the conflicting qualities that both his sons possess.

When Sean Penn first heard Bruce Springsteen’s song “Highway Patrolman” in 1982 it gave “flashes of pictures” in his head and began applying characters and a story to these images. He was inspired to write a screenplay in a month while filming We’re No Angels (1989). He had actually been writing scripts since 1980 and knew exactly what he wanted the film to look like but didn’t know if he could get the financing or the rights to the song. The first title Penn came up with for his script was A Slow Coming Dark, then Greetings from the Wasteland, and finally The Indian Runner. This last one came from a book about Native American Indian running, which he had read.

He called Springsteen and got his blessing. He then approached producer Don Phillips (Fast Times at Ridgemont High) with several of his scripts, one of them being The Indian Runner. That was the one Phillips picked. Penn told him that it had been written by a prison inmate named J. Claude McBee and did this because he wanted an honest opinion, not one based on pre-conceived ideas people had about him. Penn wanted the script to speak for itself. Phillips gave the script to two producers who liked it but felt that the ending wasn’t commercial enough to get the film funded. Penn shelved his project until Phillips’ friend and fellow producer Thom Mount had set up a deal with Japanese funding to bankroll a slate of films. Mount was a fan of Penn’s work and agreed to back his film.

Early on, Penn thought of playing Frank himself and discussed the project with his We’re No Angels co-star Robert De Niro. One day, Penn had a television on with the sound off and saw Viggo Mortensen in Fresh Horses (1988). He only had a cameo but Penn was struck by how closely he resembled the image of Frank he had in his mind while writing the script. He was also struck by Mortensen’s “angularity, a severity to his handsomeness that I perceived as being like Frank.” Penn and Phillips flew to Tucson, Arizona to meet Mortensen on the set of Young Guns II (1990) and he agreed to do the film.

For the role of Joe, Penn wanted David Morse who he had seen in a film called Inside Moves (1980). He was impressed by the actor’s “kind of soulful dignity.” The two men met and Penn decided to cast him. However, Phillips didn’t want to cast Morse because he couldn’t see the actor and Mortensen as brothers. Penn paid for a screen test for Morse and wrote a scene specifically for the actor to perform that was not in the film. Morse nailed it and Phillips was convinced.

For the role of Frank and Joe’s father, Penn had originally cast Gene Hackman and then Jon Voight was considered. Penn finally cast Charles Bronson based on what he knew about the difficult times in the actor’s private life, chief among them standing by his wife Jill Ireland’s battle with cancer. Penn wanted Sandy Dennis to play the mother but he learned that she was dying of cancer. He flew to New York City and met with her. She agreed to do the film.

Based on his admiration of ‘70s cinema, Penn sought out crew members that had worked during that era. He hired Hal Ashby’s long-time production designer Michael Haller and Anthony Richmond as his director of photography. The latter had worked on several key Nicholas Roeg films during ‘70s and that was the look Penn wanted to capture with his own film.

During rehearsals, Penn encouraged Morse, Mortensen and cast members Valeria Golina and Patricia Arquette to spend as much together as possible. This involved hanging out on location in Omaha. For the final confrontation between Frank and Joe in a bar, Penn had Morse and Mortensen rehearse for two weeks. The bar set was built in a gymnasium which allowed the two actors to shoot baskets when they needed to blow off steam. Morse felt that Mortensen was holding back during rehearsals. When it came to filming the scene, Penn recalled stimulating Mortensen’s temper by getting “a little bit personal. But I think he was professionally responsive. He knew where to go for what I was looking for.”

The Indian Runner was shot entirely on location in Nebraska in 50 days on a budget of $9 million. It had its world premiere at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival. The film received generally positive reviews from critics at the time. Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars and wrote, “It's impressive, how thoughtfully Penn handles this material. The good brother isn't a straight arrow, and the bad brother isn't romanticized as a rebel without a cause, and there are no easy solutions or neat little happy endings for this story. It's as intractable as life itself.” In her review for The New York Times, Janet Maslin praised Mortensen as “a magnetic actor capable of both scary outbursts and eerie, reptilian calm.” The Globe and Mail’s Jay Scott wrote, “The film is mesmerizing in part because the drama between the two brothers is predictable; it is thoughtful and funny because it seldom goes out of its way to be either, and it emerges as one of the best movies yet made about the sixties because it is not actually about the sixties – it's about people in the sixties.”

In his review for Newsweek magazine, David Ansen said of Penn’s direction, “You can sense that he's grappling with his own demons in this anguished story of a collision between brutishness and responsibility. Whatever its flaws, this one comes from the gut.” Entertainment Weekly gave the film a “B-“ rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, “And though the movie is sometimes too mannered (during one unaccountable stretch, Penn suddenly turns into Diane Arbus and peppers the screen with small-town grotesques), it has an accomplished rhythmic flow, a sense of people's destinies unfolding step by step.” However, USA Today gave the film two out of four stars and Susan Wloszczyna wrote, “To pump up the entertainment level, Penn tosses in a few freaks: a bearded lady, a demonic bartender (the aptly cast Dennis Hopper), a cross-eyed town crazy. But the sideshow can't leaven the unrelentingly heavy mood.”

In many of his roles, Penn often wrestles with notions of masculinity – what makes a man? You see it in films like At Close Range (1986), Dead Man Walking (1995) and Mystic River (2003). He continues this examination with The Indian Runner about two very different men – one who can express his emotions and one who cannot. Or, rather, when he does it comes out in rage and violence. How does someone like that exist in normal society? Frank is a free spirit that refuses to be tied down by the conventions of a normal family life and a 9 to 5 job. Joe knows this but thinks he can change his brother and is forced to realize that no one can domesticate him. The only solution is to allow Frank to be free to live his own life. Frank puts it this way, “There’s only two kinds of men in this hell: that’s heroes and outlaws. Which one are you?” Penn ends his film on an enigmatic note – one in which I think the end of Springsteen’s song addresses:

“Me and Franky laughin' and drinkin', nothin' feels better than blood on blood
Takin' turns dancin' with Maria as the band played "Night of the Johnstown Flood"
I catch him when he's strayin' like any brother would
Man turns his back on his family, he just ain't no good”

One of the tantalizing questions The Indian Runner poses is, did being in the Vietnam War screw up Frank even more or was he already like that to begin with? Joe refers to his brother being a troublemaker in his youth. Where did he go wrong? Was he always that way? The film never answers these questions definitively but it is interesting to speculate every time I watch it. The only problem I have with this film is that Penn tends to lay the Indian runner analogy on a little too thick, especially in the scene where Frank and Joe chase each other through a cornfield late at night, but it’s a minor quibble in an otherwise fantastic directorial debut. While I enjoyed his subsequent efforts, The Crossing Guard (1995) and especially The Pledge (2001), I still regard The Indian Runner as his best film behind the camera. So many of Bruce Springsteen’s songs are mini-movies that tell a compelling story that it’s amazing no one has turned one into a film before. He is a master at depicting the struggles of the blue collar American in his songs; Penn gets that and successfully translated it into a film.

SOURCES

Carr, Jay. “Sean Penn Happier Behind Camera.” Boston Globe. December 26, 1991.

Dunphy, Catherine. “Penn Tired of Talking about Bad Boy Days.” Toronto Star. September 10, 1991.

Frankel, Martha. “After Writing & Directing The Indian Runner, Sean Penn Swears He’ll Never Act Again. Interview. September 1991.

Gristwood, Sarah. “Running Against Form.” The Guardian. November 28, 1991.

“How Sean Penn Found New Direction in Directing.” Philadelphia Inquirer. June 1992.

Kelly, Richard T. Sean Penn: His Life and Times. Faber & Faber. 2004.

Scott, Jay. “The Recasting of Sean Penn.” Globe and Mail. September 13, 1991.

Weber, Bruce. “Sean Penn, Human Tempest, Settles into the Auteur’s Life. The New York Times. September 15, 1991.

Flatliners

Flatliners (1990) may be best remembered as a film that featured a cast of young actors either on the cusp of being bonafide movie stars (William Baldwin) or who were already there (Julia Roberts). Featuring the likes of Kiefer Sutherland and Kevin Bacon, you’d be hard pressed to assemble this cast now but back then the film’s director Joel Schumacher had the Midas touch, making his name with the Brat Pack dramedy St. Elmo’s Fire (1985) and the popcorn thrill ride cum horror film The Lost Boys (1987). Flatliners was an attempt at more serious, weightier fare albeit filtered through his commercial sensibilities. It features a top notch premise: five medical students attempt to cheat death by killing themselves for several minutes so as to uncover any evidence of an afterlife. However, once they’re revived what they experienced while dead comes back to literally haunt them.


Flatliners came out at a time when Hollywood was fascinated with death and the afterlife as similarly-themed films Ghost (1990) and Jacob’s Ladder (1990) all came out in the same year. Flatliners resides somewhere in the middle as it shares some of the romantic aspirations and notions of forgiveness with Ghost while also including some of the otherworldly thriller aspects of Jacob’s Ladder. Art directed within an inch of its life by Schumacher, Flatliners was a commercial success (with that cast how could it not?) and received mostly positive notices. It has by and large disappeared from the public consciousness only to pop up occasionally on television. I’ve always been fascinated by its overtly stylish look and its thoroughly unlikable protagonist. Actually, all of the main characters typify the materialistic “me generation” that came of age in the 1980’s. I also admire Peter Filardi’s awkward attempts to tackle substantial issues, like life after death, bullying, and infidelity, in his screenplay even if he isn’t always successful or we’re distracted by Jan de Bont’s atmospheric cinematography.

Schumacher sets the right tone visually as he introduces the film’s central protagonist, Nelson Wright (Kiefer Sutherland), clad in the ‘80s uniform of sunglasses, trenchcoat and black shirt and pants because, y’know, he’s a got a dark side. The camera zooms in on Nelson who says to no one in particular, “Today is a good day to die.” While all of this is happening, the soundtrack blasts an ominous beat straight out of a John Carpenter film only to inject a pretentious choir vocalizing over top. Fortunately, we’re spared any more of this sonic claptrap as Schumacher slam edits us right in the middle of an emergency room as David Labraccio (Kevin Bacon) frantically tries to save a poor woman in bad shape. She’s wheeled into a room so painfully stark white that it resembles the strange bedroom at the end of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). Labraccio is a brilliant but impulsive medical student who goes ahead and saves the patient’s life anyway when the doctor doesn’t show up fast enough. He is the brilliant yet angry rebel. He’s such a non-conformist that when Nelson goes looking for him he finds the guy rappelling out his dorm window and down the side of the building because, y’know, he doesn’t have time for the stairs.

Rachel Mannus (Julia Roberts) is the smart med student who keeps her colleagues at a distance. She’s fascinated with life after death because her father committed suicide. Rachel does rounds in a ward with a few elderly patients whom she dotes on, hoping to get some insight into what it’s like to be so close to death. The romance between Labraccio and Rachel feels tacked on. In one scene, they’re good friends and in another they’re sleeping in bed together. It feels like a scene was edited out somewhere in post-production that showed them getting together. Joe Hurley (William Baldwin) is the ladies man with a thing for videotaping his many conquests in-between classes with his fellow med students. Joe’s past is the weakest of the bunch because of its abrupt conclusion. He only seems remorseful because he got caught.

Nelson is a master manipulator who knows exactly what to say to the four other med students so that they will help kill himself all in the name of fame and fortune – oh, and science, of course (that’s merely a side effect). We are introduced to Randy Steckle (Oliver Platt) repeatedly reciting his future job title as he is already self-mythologizing himself. The film quickly and efficiently establishes the main characters and everyone but poor Steckle gets a backstory that provides motivation for why they are willing to kill themselves for a glimpse of the afterlife. I guess, since he’s the only one who doesn’t die and is then resuscitated, he gets marginalized, which is too bad because Oliver Platt is such an intriguing actor to watch and he’s basically reduced to the role of whiney complainer with the occasional comic relief. He is the handwringing Mother Hen with a sarcastic sense of humor, like when he calls Nelson on his ulterior motives for what he’s doing: “This isn’t for mankind, this is for Nelson. Why do I suddenly see you on 60 Minutes sandwiched in-between Andy Rooney and a Subaru commercial?”

Kiefer Sutherland is a little too good at playing a Preppie prick (also see Bright Lights, Big City) as Nelson is an egomaniac looking to make a name for himself. He has never been afraid to play unlikable characters (see Stand by Me or Mirrors) and despite his karmic comeuppance, there is no real indication that Nelson will change all that much despite gaining closure on his past. There is a delicious irony that we get to see a little kid kick the crap out of him – something I’m sure we won’t see on his career reel if the American Film Institute ever decides to celebrate his filmography. One can see what might have drawn Sutherland to this role as he gets to literally shed his pretty boy image by becoming increasingly battered and scarred over the course of the film. Kevin Bacon is good as the skeptic who goes under in order to put his atheism to the test. He plays the voice of reason. Blessed with his family’s good look, William Baldwin is well-cast as the narcissistic pretty boy. The success of this film led to him headlining Ron Howard’s ode to firefighters, Backdraft (1991) and Sliver (1993), an erotic thriller with Sharon Stone. Julia Roberts makes for a credible caregiver but I don’t quite buy her as a brilliant med student.

Flatliners features one ridiculously over-art directed set after another. For example, the room where our med student protagonists practice on cadavers resembles the Metropolitan Museum of Art, not a med school, but it does look fantastic and creates a semi-solemn mood with its impressive-looking Gothic architecture. Check out Nelson’s “apartment” with its high ceilings, ornate paneling and stunning window frames that look like it came out of an Architectural Digest magazine photoshoot. How does a med student afford a place like that? Of course, he could be a trust fund baby born with a silver spoon in his mouth. In case we didn’t get the whole life and death thing that the main characters wrestle with through the entire film, Schumacher makes sure we do by repeatedly lingering on statues of angels and an engraving of a man in a tug of war with Death while that damn choir sings on the soundtrack again! Hell, we even get a shot of Nelson standing right next to a statute with angel wings. Ok, Schumacher, we get it! The night scenes feature slick city streets and smoke billowing in the background for no apparent reason but it does look cool.

The film’s concept of the afterlife consists of the sins of our past – with Nelson it is accidentally killing a young boy when he was a child; Labraccio verbally abused a little girl when he was in grade school; for Rachel it was witnessing her father committing suicide; and for Joe it is all of his sexual conquests coming back to haunt him. Flatliners equates going to the afterlife with an adrenaline rush – the ultimate extreme sport. The flatline/afterlife sequences are obviously the highlight of the film and are beautifully shot by then-cinematographer, later film director, Jan de Bont who expertly utilizes the widescreen frame. He helps give the streets of Chicago a nightmarish look right out of Dante’s Inferno with alleyway fires and then switches to a cool blue look when Nelson goes through a maze of underground passages in the city subway system.

Labraccio’s afterlife sequence looks frightening enough as it takes place on an atmospherically-lit subway but becomes unintentionally funny when he is trash-talked by a little black girl. It’s supposed to be scary but illicits belly laughs as opposed to chills. Much more successful is Rachel’s nightmarish visions of her father’s suicide. She interrupts him in a bathroom saturated with hellish red light as he shoots himself up with heroin. Roberts’ reaction to this primal scene is pretty bad as her attempt at emoting fails. The most extravagant afterlife sequences are reserved for Nelson, of course, because he is the central protagonist. His childhood nemesis is much more intimidating because of his vengeful demeanor.

Then-unknown Boston screenwriter Peter Filardi got the idea for Flatliners in 1988 based on two sources of inspiration. A close friend of his had an allergic reaction to the anesthesia after an operation and had a near-death experience. Filardi was shaken up by what had happened and it “shook up my imagination too.” He realized that death hadn’t really been explored for his twentysomething generation and thought, “What is more intriguing than death itself?” He wrote the script during the Irangate scandal and the United States elections with words like “accountability” being used a lot. From this, he conceived of a group of “young, ‘90s kids who would learn a lesson,” from experimenting with death. He researched medical technology and CPR techniques. Filardi wrote the first draft in two months but wasn’t sure if it was ready to be read. He continued to work on it while writing screenplays for television.

Meanwhile, his former agent Ben Conway shopped the Flatliners script around Hollywood in January 1989 where it quickly became a hot commodity with a six-figure bidding war breaking out among several major producers. In one week, five bids were received with producer Scott Rudin, who had a production deal with Columbia Pictures, coming out on top. However, he reportedly violated protocol by bidding against another producer on the lot – Michael Douglas and his production company Stonebridge Entertainment. Then studio president Dawn Steel stepped in and gave the project to Douglas while Rudin left Columbia for Paramount Studios. Douglas sent the script to director Joel Schumacher during the summer of ’89. The director was in pre-production on his passion project, an adaptation of the Phantom of the Opera, but found himself drawn to the themes of atonement and forgiveness in Filardi’s script.

Schumacher was hired to direct and worked with Filardi to fine-tune the script, including changing the setting. The screenwriter had originally set it in his hometown of Boston but the director changed it to Chicago because he preferred the locations. Filardi also originally envisioned a more realistic approach but Schumacher went for a more Gothic look. Before the start of principal photography, Filardi asked Schumacher about this and the director told him, “I want the film to look as daring as the characters are daring.” To his credit, the director had the screenwriter on set every day doing rewrites when necessary and listening to actors’ suggestions, sometimes incorporating them into the dialogue. To prepare for the film, Schumacher read books on near-death experiences and listened to tapes of people relating their experiences. The cast did some medical research and acquired video tapes of medical procedures. There was also a doctor and a nurse on standby when the actors were on set dealing with needles and CPR equipment.

Flatliners enjoyed most positive reviews among mainstream critics. Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars and wrote, “There were some hazards in this project – with the wrong note, they easily could look silly – and yet they take their chances and pull it off. Flatliners is an original, intelligent thriller, well-directed by Joel Schumacher. In her review for The New York Times, Caryn James wrote, “But when taken on its own stylish terms, Flatliners is greatly entertaining. Viewers are likely to go along with this film instantly or else ridicule it to death. Its atmospheric approach doesn't admit much middle ground. The Washington Post’s Rita Kempley wrote, “Flatliners is a heart-stopping, breathtakingly sumptuous haunted house of a movie that takes off where Dracula and Dante left off and CPR began.” In his review for the Globe and Mail, Jay Scott wrote, “The cast is similarly exemplary, a quintet of outstanding equals, and for all the deadliness of its conservative conclusion, Peter Filardi’s script, his first to be produced, is alive with smart med school talk.” USA Today gave the film three out of four stars and Susan Wloszczyna wrote, “Director Joel Schumacher taps his strengths: the ensemble work of St. Elmo’s Fire combined with the neo-gothic scares of The Lost Boys.”

However, Entertainment Weekly gave the film a “D” rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, “Julia Roberts' fans will be disappointed to see that her follow-up to Pretty Woman (this one was made before anyone knew she was a star) is such a dud, and that she has a relatively minor role in it. The part doesn't give her much of a chance — but then she doesn't do much with it except to stand around and look beautiful and concerned.” In his review for the Los Angeles Times, Michael Wilmington felt that the cast was trapped “in this great cavernous museum of a movie, with a dry little pea of an idea rattling down echoing hallways. It almost seems a cheat that the filmmakers don't show any inkling that emptiness and flashy camp may tinge their ‘philosophy.’”

It may seem like I’m criticizing Flatliners for its unrealistic stylistic flourishes but they are an important reason why I continue to be fascinated with this film after all these years. It is such a product of its times and has a fantastic premise as well. It’s hard to sympathize with most of these characters because they are self-absorbed in nature and so it is up to the actors and their natural charisma to get us to care about what happens to them, hence the casting of people like Bacon, Roberts and Sutherland who were all popular movie stars at the time. Roberts and Sutherland in particular were front and center on the pop culture radar having recently become romantically involved during filming. Ultimately, Flatliners is about sins that must be absolved and perceived guilt that must be eliminated. Both of which stem from their respective childhoods. Once they confront the sources of these issues and apologize or get closure only then are they able to be redeemed.

 
For further reading, check out Erich Kuersten's awesome review over at his blog, Acidemic. His article is actually what inspired me to write my own.

SOURCES

Emerson, Jim. “To Sutherland Work is More Than a Job.” Orange County Register. August 7, 1990.

Fox, David J. “Flatliners Rookie Writer Hits It Big.” Los Angeles Times. August 7, 1990.

Stanley, John. “Flatliners New Writer is Dead-On.” San Francisco Chronicle. August 5, 1990.

Van Gelder, Lawrence. “At the Movies: Life and Death.” The New York Times. August 10, 1990.