Movie Stats:
Released 1988 (USA)
American, in English
Director - Alan Parker
Stars - Gene Hackman, Willem Dafoe, and many others
Plot Summary:
Based on a true story. In Mississippi during the summer of 1964, when three young civil rights workers go missing, FBI agents Rupert Anderson (Hackman) and Alan Ward (Dafoe) are sent to investigate.
Warnings:
Heavy blue language (including racial slurs); heavy violence; gore.
Bad Stuff:
The very last still shot was a bit ham-handed.
I didn’t care for some of the music (mostly the stuff in chase scenes); it felt too modern compared to the music in the rest of the film.
The FBI tactics portrayed toward the end of the film weren’t exactly believable but I decided to roll with it anyway.
Good Stuff:
The acting is all very good.
I enjoyed the shifting relationship between Anderson and Ward. They never dislike one another, but they don’t always respect each other. There’s a lot of distrust there. I liked watching them learn how to work together and integrate their disparate styles.
It felt well-crafted. From the first scene to the last, it told the story in such a riveting style that I never turned away, even though the subject matter was very upsetting to me.
About the Performance:
I really liked Hackman in this. It’s probably my favorite performance of his. Just like Ward, I initially felt suspicious of him. Is he on the same page? Does he want the same outcome as Ward and us, the viewers? The more you understand him and his motivations, the more you like him. Hackman does a great job portraying a man who understands what he’s up against because it’s what he’s come from. I would have enjoyed an even deeper exploration of how he came to be the person he was.
Other performances of Hackman’s I’ve reviewed: Unforgiven; Reds; Superman; The French Connection; Bonnie and Clyde.
The Verdict:
I thought this was a great movie. It is, however, a very difficult movie. I felt upset through pretty much the whole thing, right from the first scene. It’s a hard topic and it’s not fun, seeing people treat other people this way. While the film is dramatized, I know enough about history to know it wasn’t that far from the truth. Still, the difficulty of the material doesn’t detract from the overall quality of the film. I thought it was a masterpiece of storytelling that featured many fine actors doing excellent work.
I give it 4.5 stars.
2 comments:
This sounds like a quality film I will never get around to watching due to subject matter. :-)
I tend to like Gene Hackman. He's reliable and not flashy.
Have you seen Superman? He's very over the top in that, haha. In today's social climate, I found it difficult to watch a film about race.
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