Brittany+Balbag

Movie: L.A. Confidential (1997) Cast: Russel Crow, Kim Basinger, Guy Pearce, Kevin Spacey, James Cromwell, Danny DeVito Film Genre: Neo-noir (modern day film noir)

The film L.A Confidential is an adaption of the Hollywood crime/noir novel by James Ellroy. It was cowritten and directed by Curtis Hanson. It is mainly about police corruption in Los Angeles in 1950s. Film noir is a term to describe dark Hollywood crime dramas in the 1950s. The story is about three policemen who eventually at set out to the uncover the mystery of the Nite Owl coffee shop massacre.

Main characters: Officer Bud White: a feared man on the LAPD who wants revenge on Exley for ratting out his partner Stenson for beating up Mexican prisoners. He privately investigates the Night Owl Case after his partner is murdered. In his investigation he meets Lynn Braken who he develops a relationship with. He has particularly hate for wife-beaters since his own mother was beaten.

Lt. Det. Ed Exley: the son of a legendary LAPD cop and brilliant, but unpopular detective who is willing to do anything to rise in ranks by selling out his fellow policemen. In the beginning of the movie, he rises to lieutenant detective. After realizing the black men were not the murderers in the Nite Owl case, he sets out to do right and find justice even if it means at his own expense.

Det. Sgt. Jack Vinceness: Jack Vincennes a popular cop who likes to bask in the Hollywood glow, moonlighting as the technical advisor of a police show called Badge of Honor. Vincennes also receives hefty payoffs from Hush-Hush magazine for making orchestrated celebrity arrests, often involving narcotics.

Cpt. Dudley: Repsected and look up to on member of his force. Unsuspected, he is really running organized crime in LA after Mikey Cohen is put in jail.

Lynn Braken: a Prostitue look-a-like of famous actress Veronica Lane who works for Patchett; develops a relationship with White.

Pierce Patchett: Sell and invests in property; secretly runs a prositution ring. involved in drug dealing, in cohoots with Dudley.

Summary of Plot: The plot revolves around the Nite Owl coffee shop massacre, which left six people dead including Bud White's (Russel Crowe) partner, officer Stenson. During this time Mickey Cohen, leader of organized crime, was put behind bars and various members of his gang were shot down. The night before Bud meets Lynn (Kim Basinger) at booze store and find out she is riding with lady named Susan Lefferts and two men, who he finds out later to be name Patchett and Leland Buzz Meeks (an ex-cop). A couple of black men are blamed for the shootings and are eventually killed by Lt. Exley (Pearce). However, Exley learns that the sole witness lied and so sets out to find the real murderer with Jack Vincennes. Bud, who discovers that Susan Leffert was one of the victims of the massacre, sets out to question Patchett and learns Lynn and Susan are apart of a prositituion brothel runned by Patchett. Discovering that someone was with his partner during the massacre, Bud connects Lefferts as Stenson's girlfriend and in a twisting turn of events discovers Meeks is found body down in the cellar in Leffert's mother's house. He also discovers that Meeks was involved in a heroin deal. Exley and Vincennes, who follow Bud's trail, discover that Meek and Stenson were partner and that they were on series of case reports involving Patchett that were conviently overturned. Noticing that Lt. Dudley was supervising officer on the reports, Vinceness goes to question Dudley, but before he catches on to what is really happening Dudley kills him. However, Bud and Exley eventually connect the dots and after threatening the district attorney, find out that Cpt. Dudley not only behind the shootings but is the new leader of organized crime. After a shootout, Dudley reveals to Bud and Exley that Stenson was shot over dispute over a heroin deal. Exley eveutally shoots Dudley before the police arrive and reveals everything to police; however, in an effort to cover up what happened the police department make it seem like Dudley and Exley are heros.

Opinion: I thought this film was very interesting. The plot is very complex and was little hard to follow for me. Nevertheless, it kept me intrigued and in suspense. Stylistically filming wise, there was nothing really that stood out. Since the movie was in color there wasn't black and white style characteristic of film noirs. I like how the realness of the characters and how they were developed; all the characters had layers. It had the typical film noir characters- the private eye detectives and the femme fatal (Basinger). This plot is kind of like ours- corruption in the system is revealed with a twist the person in charge turns out to be the bady guy. This film is good example of the mood of film noirs it a dark tone, concentrating on the corruption of the characters and their surroudings. This is something we will have to achieve in a our film. One way we achieve this is through dim lighting, which gives our film a moody tone to it; however I think our film could be a little more serious. Film noir particularly focuses on the character's view and how corruption affects him/her. Our film is short so it is difficult to develop the characters.