Fine, I think this is massively overrated. It doesn’t entirely work as pulp, nor as art. It’s too well written and the performances are too good to simply neglect it as a formulaic noir thriller. On the other hand, this feels visually too pastiche, it’s a director doing an impression of Roman Polanski, except it’s not as precise. Some directorial choices in particular feel over the top given how serious the movie is (e.g. the music choice during the fight at the police station; RusselI Crowe seemingly having superhuman strength in some scenes; a cop character threatening someone by hanging the person out of a window), but I would say that most of it is competently done. Still, I find it weird that its lack of ingenuity didn’t get panned at the time, because it came out in an era where you had the Coen brothers (Fargo, Blood Simple, Miller’s Crossing) and David Fincher (Se7en) doing much more inventive stuff in this genre, making L.A. Confidential seem regressive by comparison. Meanwhile, I also wouldn’t say that the storytelling is its main strength. It’s a perfectly fine crime mystery with some nice twists, but the three main characters are way too one-dimensional, and what is ends up saying about its themes (justice, redemption) is pretty thin and general. It’s also not the kind of film where you’re going to remember individual bits or scenes, this is focussed on the bigger picture, and that picture is nothing special. It’s essentially a b-movie that’s elevated by the talent that’s involved in front of and behind the camera, but that doesn’t stop it from being average.
Review by JordyVIP 8BlockedParent2023-01-27T22:54:20Z
Fine, I think this is massively overrated. It doesn’t entirely work as pulp, nor as art. It’s too well written and the performances are too good to simply neglect it as a formulaic noir thriller. On the other hand, this feels visually too pastiche, it’s a director doing an impression of Roman Polanski, except it’s not as precise. Some directorial choices in particular feel over the top given how serious the movie is (e.g. the music choice during the fight at the police station; RusselI Crowe seemingly having superhuman strength in some scenes; a cop character threatening someone by hanging the person out of a window), but I would say that most of it is competently done. Still, I find it weird that its lack of ingenuity didn’t get panned at the time, because it came out in an era where you had the Coen brothers (Fargo, Blood Simple, Miller’s Crossing) and David Fincher (Se7en) doing much more inventive stuff in this genre, making L.A. Confidential seem regressive by comparison. Meanwhile, I also wouldn’t say that the storytelling is its main strength. It’s a perfectly fine crime mystery with some nice twists, but the three main characters are way too one-dimensional, and what is ends up saying about its themes (justice, redemption) is pretty thin and general. It’s also not the kind of film where you’re going to remember individual bits or scenes, this is focussed on the bigger picture, and that picture is nothing special. It’s essentially a b-movie that’s elevated by the talent that’s involved in front of and behind the camera, but that doesn’t stop it from being average.
5.5/10