Wednesday, March 15, 2006
NASTY
Here is a little piece of film work that is irredeemably nasty:
That doesn't mean it is a bad picture.
It takes rotten cops and show business scandal and wraps it together. It also satisfies the need to see Los Angeles as a shitty place to be; under the tinsel.
It is thrilling and a bit satisfying to see the virtuous get slimed.
On the other hand, it brings up the current discussion of the film Crash, another. supposedly realistic, look at the LA underbelly.
But we don't want to see the good stuff, only the seamy and evil.
That said, I have to admit that I had a good time looking at Russell Crowe play to type as a hair trigger angry brute cop.
Guy Pierce, always welcome, was virtue doomed to be spoiled.
Kevin Spacey played Kevin Spacey.
Kim Basinger got an Oscar for support and I guess that is OK.
What else?
I will give it a 4 out of Netflix5 because it looks so good and because Kevin Spacey gets drilled earlier than anyone could have expected.
The story is wrapped around a gossip magazine. There was a real counterpart at the time of the film.
You have to be old enough to remember the brief but florid life of Confidential Magazine.
It was the scandal sheet of the day; the checkout reading.
It lost a few defamation suits; most famously by Liberace. It ruined them.
But in its time it scared the bejeezus out of a lot of public figures.
There is also reference to Mickey Cohen and other hoods. Johnny Stampanato who was Lana Turner's boyfriend made the film as well as Lana. A lot of headlines and crime pictures of the time are used as well.
I remember a lot of it. Stampanato got time for beating Turner up.
