Day 182 - 7/1/09 - Movie #182
BEFORE: 6 months into this project, and for some reason I feel like I'm finally getting to some of the really meaty films - is it the presence of De Niro at work, or just that I'm crossing off some films that I've been meaning to watch for such a long time?
THE PLOT: The sheriff of a suburban New Jersey community populated by New York City policeman slowly discovers the town is a front for corruption.
AFTER: Sylvester Stallone, Harvey Keitel, Ray Liotta, Michael Rapaport, John Spencer, Janeane Garofalo, and about 6 cast members of the Sopranos (Edie Falco, Robert Patrick, Annabella Sciorra, Frank Vincent, John Ventimiglia, and Tony Sirico) - jeez, is there anyone who's NOT in this movie?
Stallone plays the sheriff of Garrison, NJ (ah, a garrison is an armed outpost of soldiers - I get it!) but an incident on the G.Washington Bridge sets off a chain of events that brings De Niro's internal affairs officer to come sniffing around. How deep do the town's secrets go? I've never been a big Stallone fan, but this film is a cut above his usual movies about arm-wrestling or such. Too many characters, though - I think the story could have been condensed a lot.
RATING: 6 out of 10 traffic tickets
DENIR-O-METER: 3, unfortunately. It's really Stallone and Keitel's movie, though De Niro manages to shine in a limited role - I'm surprised that his "You BLEW it!" line didn't catch on like "Are you talkin' to ME?" did...
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>>>I'm surprised that his "You BLEW it!" line didn't catch on like "Are you talkin' to ME?" did<<<
ReplyDeleteThe same can be said for his awesome rant at a young firefighter in "Backdraft." DeNiro plays the older, more-seasoned, former firefighter, now fire inspector and he's disciplining a "probie" (probationary officer). He's recanting the events of the fire to the youngin' in a normal tone, but you can hear him start to get angry and he can't control his anger anymore and he yells, "YOU PUNCHED OUT A WINDOW FOR VENTILATION... WAS THAT BEFORE OR AFTER YOU NOTICED YOU WERE STANDING IN A PUDDLE OF GASOLINE, YOU IDIOT!!" Gold...