THE DEVIL'S OWN
A film review by Scott Renshaw
Copyright 1997 Scott Renshaw
(Columbia) Starring: Harrison Ford, Brad Pitt, Margaret Colin, Ruben Blades, Treat Williams, Natascha McElhone. Screenplay: David Aaron Cohen & Vincent Patrick & Kevin Jarre. Producers: Lawrence Gordon and Robert F. Colesberry. Director: Alan J. Pakula. MPAA Rating: R (profanity, violence) Running Time: 107 minutes. Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
You can bet that Sony Pictures executives have spent plenty of time in the last few weeks hoping that there is, in fact, no such thing as bad press. Rumors of on-set tension have been swirling for months, production delays bumped the film from its higher-profile fall '96 release date, and reports had the budget creeping into the $90 million range. Then, in a Newsweek interview, Brad Pitt took a few shots at the mid-stream script changes on his upcoming film THE DEVIL'S OWN, inspiring the kind of spin control usually seen only on the teacup ride at Disneyland. Pitt's comments were surprising in an era when stars are generally obliged to swoon over their latest project, but it may be even more surprising to see the end product of the process which frustrated him so. THE DEVIL'S OWN is an uncommonly thoughtful suspense film with a razor-sharp performance by Pitt, proving that Pitt's standards may be considerably higher than anyone else's in Hollywood. If anything, it is the missed opportunities for even more detailed characterizations which end up disappointing.
Pitt plays Frankie McGuire, a native of Northern Ireland with a haunted past and a challenging present. A man who watched as a young boy while his father was gunned down as a Republican sympathizer, Frankie has become a notorious IRA terrorist wanted for several bombings and murders. With superior government firepower threatening to overwhelm them, the IRA sends Frankie to the U. S. to purchase black market missiles for their effort. Aided by American friends, Frankie comes to New York under the name Rory Devaney, and is put up in the home of unsuspecting veteran cop Tom O'Meara (Harrison Ford). Rory soon becomes close with the O'Meara family, but they are all put at risk when complications develop in the transaction with arms dealer Billy Burke (Treat Williams). Soon two men with differing concepts of duty will be set not just against a common enemy, but against each other.
THE DEVIL'S OWN clearly wants to establish a father-son dynamic between Tom (who has three daughters but no sons) and Rory, and it works primarily because it never strains too hard to make the point. The bonding between them is casual and un-dramatic -- a game of pool here, a snippet of conversation there -- and director Alan J. Pakula trusts the actors to establish a connection without resorting to trite dialogue or inappropriate outbursts of emotion. These are two quiet, determined men who simply seem to like each other and enjoy each other's company.
We like them, too, and for quite a while both of them are the heroes of THE DEVIL'S OWN...until Pitt kicks his performance into another gear. Though the film's opening scenes show Frankie in a gun battle with government troops in Belfast, we come to believe that the soft-spoken man in New York is the "real" Frankie/Rory. That man is as fictional as "Rory Devaney," however, the man Frankie might have been if he had lived another life. He turns utterly ruthless when his back is against the wall, and Pitt gives him the weariness of a man who cannot afford the luxury of a conscience. Pitt plays the anti-hero to Ford's more conventional square-jawed hero, and it is hard to choose sides between them. It is a unique conflict for a Hollywood film, a struggle between two people whose moralities were determined by their circumstances, and who both believe firmly that they are in the right.
In a film with such an unconventional struggle at its center, it is all the more jarring when conventional formula elements rear their ugly heads. Obligatory psycho-villain Treat Williams gets to ooze malevolence and serve up severed heads; obligatory romantic interest Natascha McElhone gets to be gorgeous and supportive of Frankie. There is a distracting sub-plot as well, concerning the involvement of Tom's partner Eddie (Ruben Blades) in the shooting of a car thief, which serves only as yet another reminder that Tom is honest, hates violence, and believes in the letter of the law. When THE DEVIL'S OWN begins to resemble low-rent DIE HARD clones, it drifts.
Those occurrences are relatively rare, however, because THE DEVIL'S OWN doesn't move the way you expect suspense thrillers to move. The action sequences are infrequent but emphatic, with a premium placed on the patient establishment of character. Still, there is a moment late in THE DEVIL'S OWN (during a climax reportedly re-shot just a few months prior to opening) which may be an example of what Pitt was complaining about to Newsweek. In that scene, Tom suggests that he never wanted to be a cop, a sub-text which appears out of nowhere and might have given more depth to the character throughout the film. There are certainly instances where THE DEVIL'S OWN feels like the product of a script-by-committee, but the star power of Ford and Pitt in an intriguing relationship guides it over its rough points. I could only hope to be subjected to more "troubled productions" like this.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 lucky devils: 7.
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