CITY HALL
A film review by Ben Hoffman
Copyright 1996 Ben Hoffman
Ken Lipper, who wrote the original screenplay, helps give the film an air of authenticity. Lipper used to be a deputy Mayor when New York City's mayor was Ed Koch. Lipper knows the ins and outs of running a city such as New York and surely was of valuable help to Director Harold Becker, along with the other screenwriters, Paul Schrader, Nick Pillegi and Bo Goldman. Given the air of truth coupled with some very fine acting, and real dialog, CITY HALL is a gripping winner.
The City is well-run until, in a shootout between a drug-dealer and a policeman, a young black child gets fatally shot. Little by little we learn that the confrontation may not be all that appears on the surface. For one thing, the drug-dealer is a small timer but related to the Mafia chief. It is then further revealed that a tangled web is somewhere involved in the killing.
The black population is understandably angry. This is hardly the first innocent child to get killed in an exchange of police/gang crossfire. The buck stops at the desk of Mayor John Pappas (Al Pacino). How many more kids are going to be killed? In the film's finest, most moving scene, Mayor Pappas appears at the church where he has been told to stay away. And do not go near the coffin. Despite those warnings, Pappas shows up, and to a hostile black audience, he delivers a fiery speech. This is from the heart. This is real. And the anger of the audience is turned around to where the Mayor is seen as the one person who can and will change the way things have been previously run. It is a most moving speech and Pacino gives it all he has got which is plenty.
Assisting the mayor in every way is the very honest deputy, Kevin Calhoun, (John Cusack). Cusack, too, in his underplayed manner greatly helps enhance the film. Marybeth Cogan (Bridget Fonda) is the attorney for the dead child's family. Danny Aiello is the chief mafioso, Martin Landau is a judge, David Paymer is the city's attorney. With a cast like that, all at their best, it is no surprise that the film is superb. Do not miss this one.
Directed by Harold Becker.
4 Bytes
4 bytes = Superb 3 bytes = Too good to be missed 2 bytes = Average 1 byte = Save your money
Ben Hoffman
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews