Showing posts with label Al Pacino. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Al Pacino. Show all posts

Monday, January 16, 2017

THE PANIC IN NEEDLE PARK (1971)

Depressing, but not as depressing as I had expected, drug addiction story (set in New York City) about a young woman, Helen, who, while recovering from an abortion, is shown compassion by a small-time thief/heroin junkie named Bobby (Al Pacino).  Before you can say "I'm late for my Interpretative Twerking class!", Helen has shacked up with Bobby in his sleazy, rat trap apartment and become addicted to heroin herself.  In order to help pay for their addiction, she turns to prostitution.  Things just keep getting shittier and shittier from there.

Watching it now (this was my first time seeing it), all of these years after it's initial release, THE PANIC IN NEEDLE PARK is a a fascinating film on many levels.  First off, it's just a good movie.  I was really impressed with young Al Pacino's acting abilities.  Every time he's on screen, your eyes instantly go to him, to watch all of his small gestures and facial expressions.  Pacino managed to make the character of Bobby charming despite the fact he was nothing but a shitbag thief and junkie.  Another thing that I found intriguing was New York City itself.  (I've never been to NYC, but thanks to endlessly watching and re-watching Woody Allen films as a youth, I've developed a love for the town.)  The entire film was filmed in NYC, so many times during the movie I had to rewind it just to look at the stuff happening on the streets.  It was really cool...and so much trash!

No music, gritty as fook acting, dingy NYC scenery, a few scenes that should have been left on the editing room floor (the long needle scene, the entire puppy story), great ending and a few brief sightings of actors that would later become well-known including: Marcia Jean Kurtz, Raul Julia, Joe Santos and Paul Sorvino.

Overall, THE PANIC IN NEEDLE PARK is a dated film, but still very much worth watching.

Friday, August 1, 2014

CRUISING (1980)

There's a rash of brutal killings going on in the leather/S&M segment of the NYC gay community.  At the same time there's unidentified male body parts washing up on the Hudson River.  Could it all be linked to the same killer?  There's only one way to find out: throw cop Al Pacino deep undercover in the leather bar scene and see what happens.  Did he get any kind of specialized training?  How about a psychological evaluation first?  Exactly how deep undercover is he?  Can he do drugs?  Have gay sex?  What exactly is going on?  Who knows, cause none of that is ever explained.  The film opens with some crime stuff, then Al getting asked if he wants to go undercover, he agrees and BOOM! he's undercover in a gay bar looking like a fish out of water while some dude is getting fisted off to the side. 

Despite the purposeful(?) ambiguity, I really enjoyed the first 50 minutes or so, but then when it got more centered in on the crime solving and less on the gay bars I began to lose interest.  Also the vagueness of the killer was bothersome.  Did the same actor play the killer in all of the killer scenes?  I know for a fact that wasn't his real voice.  And what was up with that weak ending?  For starting off so vigorously, CRUISING busts it's thick, hot load way too soon.

I did really like the scene where Al was dancing and huffing on that rag.  Every time he hit it the colors brightened and his dancing got more animated.  Good stuff.  In summery, CRUISING is a good film, but it could have really benefited from a more straight-forward story, a more memorable killer, more brutality and much more sweaty gay sex.  A better explanation of the leather scene would have helped also.  Still, it's very much worth watching.  Keep an sharp eye out for all of the young actors that would later go on to big careers.