Mulholland Falls (1996)

Mulholland Falls(1996) has a good premise but fails to realize its potential as a great film. The depiction of The Hat squad is good and the image of L.A. during the early 50s is beautiful. The rest of the film lifts ideas that were better realized in films like The Big Heat(1953), and Chinatown(1974). Another complaint I have of this movie is that Jennifer Connelly has very little screen time and I would have liked to see more of her because she has a presence that overshadows the other actors(her character is the only person to sympathize with). Mulholland Falls(1996) would be remade in a sense a year later as L.A. Confidential(1997).

Fmovies: In a society built on the rule of law such as ours, we are constantly shown examples of evildoers who beat the system and continue to prey on the rest of us. They use the law to their advantage and dishearten most of those who go through life playing by the rules. A convicted rapist who breaks into a woman's house can sue her if he sustains an injury slipping on an errant throw-rug on his way to her bedroom.

Mulholland Falls is about four Los Angeles cops who constitute a special task force whose mission is the dispensation of justice regardless of whether that dispensation runs counter to the law. Mob types, pedophiles, and murderers beware, this L. A. isn't your kinda town! The excellent cast extends far beyond the principal actors down to a wonderful uncredited minor role played by Academy Award winning Louise Fletcher as a sardonic staff member at LAPD headquarters. Chaz Palminteri is simply superb as Nick Nolte's loyal and devoted side kick on the force. John Malkovich delivers his usual strong performance as the terminally ill Chairman of the AEC. Treat Williams is the perfect zealot in charge of base security for the Army,

and Jennifer be here!

Jennifer Connelly consistently belies the oft-held misconception that extraordinary beauty and profound talent must be mutually exclusive. Her portrayal as the party girl victim combines gut wrenching eye candy with a typically powerful and sensitive performance which ranks up there with 'Requiem for a Dream' and 'Beautiful Mind'.

It's not an awful movie but it comes rather late in a cycle of cops vs. corruption in high places during the fifteen years between Chinatown (set in 1937) and L. A. Confidential (1954) and encompassing True Confessions (ca. 1948) and Farewell my Lovely (1941). That is to say, we've seen much of this before. So have the writers, the director, and the composer. So instead of John Huston as a corrupt entrepreneur we have John Malkovich as an apparently homicidal head of the Atomic Energy Commission. The period is evoked by clothing and cars, especially a big black Buick convertible over which the camera lingers like a proud lover. But, forsooth, what ugly beasts they were, weighing as much as a Sherman tank, getting the same mileage as a prime mover, having the suspension of a giant trampoline, and decorated like a whore with chromium and fake louvres. The cops occupy the same gray area as the cops in L. A. Confidential or any of the other similar movies, dumping unwanted gangsters off "Mulholland Falls," their mocking name for a steep hill off Mulholland Drive.

Good cast, though. Nolte brings his brute-force persona to the role, gravel voiced, tough, inelegant. Chaz Palmintieri is a semi-comic sidekick (not his forte) who is, we can tell before too long, fated to undergo what so many other devoted partners without prominent roles undergo. Malkovitch is great as a wheezing, dying, ex-general who gets off a good riff on how, since atoms are mostly empty space, the very floor we stand on, our very own bodies, are little more than empty space giving off an illusion of solidity.

(I used to tell my classes the same thing and when I was finished and waiting for the applause, I'd notice that everyone was staring at me as if I'd turned into some kind of marmoset.) Jennifer Connolly has only a few lines, but what lines they are! There are few more gorgeous creatures than she now gracing the screen. Melanie Griffith is given a washed-out very blonde look. She delivers in her small part what is probably her most intense and believable performance. At no time was I ever embarrassed for her. Treat Williams is pretty good as an eminence verte. The other actors aren't faceless -- we recognize Baldwin and Ed Lauter -- but they might as well be.

The art direction lacks the temporal precision found in Chinatown or Farewell My Lovely, where even the tumblers and highball glasses were diachronically sound. Except for some subtle work in the general's house. The living room is, without ostentation, pretty gruesome in its decor -- stuffed pheasants, a table lamp that stands on (get this) stuffed deer feet!

No wonder the general babbles on about atoms. The score is as derivative as the rest of the movie. Dave Grusin has borrowed heavily from Chinatown's melancholy theme, arpeggios on plucked strings, and tremolo violins bespeaking uneasiness.

Underneath it all, though, it's another cops vs. villain movie. There are a couple of shootouts, a double plane-throwing, one or two mashed bodies. The characters are almost desperately differentiated but they are not captured. They don't do things like get a shave while they argue with other customers and banter with the barber. The film doesn't really seem to HAVE much of a setting, and it doesn't have much in the way of inhabitants. The scenes are strictly functional. Nothing is lingered over. There is no beauty here.

On the plus side, there are some great shots of a DC-3 (or C47), one of the most pilot-friend

Mulholland Falls fmovies. Along with movies such as "The public eye" or "LA Confidencial", "Mulholland Falls" is one of those products that aim to recreate the atmosphere of film noir, making everything look a little bit more modern, more violentÂ….

"Mulholland Falls" moves between the thriller and the detective movies, and the cast is its strong point: Nolte, Palminteri, Penn, MadenÂ… four time bombs, four real tough guys. When Nolte or Palminteri lose their temper you'd rather not be aroundÂ… Murder, questions, a good script, great actorsÂ… Nice movie.

*My rate: 7/10

First of all, let's get this straight - the story takes place in 1953, not the '40's. Now - you've got these four guys riding around in a convertible in bad L.A. There's a comic aspect to this little ritual, kind of Abbott and Costello times 2, but it's hard to know who's the straight man.

The plot is not a new one, but the violence has (at least) the merit of being real person-to-person violence (as differentiated from being acted in front of a blue screen and digitally augmented). There are too many "name" actors here, and (I'll grant) not much character development, but it's a chance to watch Nick Nolte and Bruce Dern do their signature performances - Nick, impassive and looming large, has played this role many times before, and always to good effect. He was better doing it in "Q&A", but that was TOO real, and a much too scary. Bruce Dern's overacting is almost reassuring and one of the few animated performances in the picture.

Melanie is subdued, being the window dressing, and they have her wearing shoulder pads, which wasn't a fifties thing, but she gives a good performance without any of the lip-licking she usually resorts to. The photography is good, the desert ominous, and watching evil Treat Williams get thrown out of the plane most entertaining.

It's not Chekov, it's not anything wonderful at all, but it reeks of ambience. I'd recommend it as an evening's entertanment. Much better, certainly, than the stuff that passes as entertainment on the big screen most of the time.

Sure wish they'd given Michael Madsen more screen time - what if they'd pushed Chaz Palmintieri out of the plane early on and beefed Mike's role? Whadya say?

This film looks fantastic and is chock-full of great actors(Nick Nolte, Melanie Griffith, Chris Penn, Bruce Dern, John Malkovich, Chazz Palminteri, and more).

A low-brow Chinatown. The 'look' of this film, and Nick Nolte's performance are the only things that are even close to the level of that earlier, finer work.

However, this is well worth a view - especially if you are looking for a throwback escape from all the new release trash that's out there today.

Sidenote: Jennifer Connelly's breasts should be the standard of perfection.

Some of the fine actors have to take a backseat because there are just so many involved here. Nolte, however, is the star of this show, and his performance is definitely noteworthy.

It's Nick's performance, and Tomahori's attention to graphic detail that make this film above average. The plot is an atomic bomb.

You'll like this if you liked: Black Dahlia, L.A. Confidential(note: this movie is nowhere near that level), Miller's Crossing and Basic Instinct.

64/100