Serpico

Day 179 - 6/28/09 - Movie #179

BEFORE: After about 6 weeks of rain in NYC, we finally got a sunny day - so as they say in baseball, let's play two... This is why I own 7 VCR's (4 of which also play DVDs, I'm not that far behind the times...) - if a tape won't play well in one deck, it might in another.

THE PLOT: The true story about an honest New York cop who blew the whistle on rampant corruption in the force only to have his comrades turn against him.

AFTER: In the 1990's, to count as a hero cop, you had to be Bruce Willis or Wesley Snipes, and save a planeload of passengers or take out a building full of terrorists. But the 1970's were a simpler time - all a movie hero cop had to do was to NOT take bribe money. But a full movie about a guy not doing something doesn't really seem action-packed. The real Serpico's investigation into graft eventually let to the formation of the Internal Affairs Bureau - but you have to figure that if a guy's been working in 10 different precincts, and can't get along with anyone in any of them, maybe the guy's just not very likable. I admire a cop who won't take a bribe, but he's just so darn high-and-mighty about it...

I liked the (unintentional?) comedy of seeing a young Al Pacino working undercover - especially when dressed like a butcher, a hippie, a Hasidic Jew... Two uncredited cameos - Judd Hirsch as a cop in the hospital scenes, and F. Murray Abraham as a narcotics cop near the end.

RATING: 6 out of 10 get-well cards