Q & A
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1990 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Sidney Lumet directed a very adult look
at police corruption, racism, and politics. The story is
complex and often hard to follow but it has a strong feel of
authenticity. Rating: +2.
I generally claim that a film can tell the same story you could tell in forty to sixty pages of prose. That rule is not infallible. Q & A is a long film (at 132 minutes) but it is amazing how much happens in the course of this realistic thriller looking at police and politics. It is difficult to believe this hard-edged film could have been directed by the same man who last year directed the much softer FAMILY BUSINESS. Q & A is complex and frankly, difficult to follow, with many more major characters than one expects to see in a film. It is nice to see a film that does not talk down to its audience even if perhaps it goes a little far in the other direction. Not making the film any easier to follow, much of the dialogue is spoken in (realistically) thick accents.
Q & A opens with policeman Mike Brennan (played by Nick Nolte) murdering a Puerto Rican drug pusher and then intimidating witnesses into saying the dead man pulled a gun on him. Called in purportedly to investigate (but actually to whitewash) is Al Reilly (played by Timothy Hutton), the new D.A.'s assistant. Reilly was formerly a policeman and the son of a much-loved legend on the police force. The case does look simple enough to start with, but a friend tips off Reilly that there may be more going on than is immediately apparent. The more Reilly digs the more he finds. His chief subject, Brennan, is a big, easy man instantly likable and quickly detestable. He has an open love of crude, though often funny, ethnic jokes that soon gives way to an obvious racism. Brennan is finding himself in an increasingly multi-ethnic, multi-racial New York and resents how things have changed since the "good old days." In fact, there are many ethnic and other minorities represented in the plot--virtually every important character is from a minority--and the hatred each group has for the others is part of what the story is about. The plot involves Irish, Italians, Puerto Ricans, gays, and Jews--Sephardic and Ashkenazic. The plot also involves a D.A.~with higher political aspirations (played by Patrick O'Neal) and a drug runner (played by Armand Asante) involved with both the victim and with Reilly's former fiancee. There is no chance I can do a reasonable job of explaining a complex and highly inter-woven plot such as Q & A in a paragraph or two.
Q & A has a very downbeat feel to it, without the sorts of heroes this sort of film would usually have. Lumet is not trying to make us like his characters but instead just wants us to see the way things are. It is set in a New York City that is as easily recognizable by the feel as by the buildings. The music is by Rube'n Blades, who also wrote the song under the titles. (Blades, incidentally, is reportedly very likely to announce soon his candidacy for the presidency of Panama.) For Lumet Q & A represents a return to a more serious style of filmmaking, such as his PRINCE OF THE CITY. I rate it a +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
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