Oh, absolutely. It's still perfect as far as I'm concerned.
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — L.A. Confidential
paramitch — 9 years ago(September 03, 2016 12:28 AM)
Oh, absolutely. It's still perfect as far as I'm concerned.
The best thing about a superbly produced period film like this one is that it never really will "age" or date itself, because it is about such a specific time and place, and the filmmakers really recreated that time, place, and atmosphere flawlessly. Many of the actors even speak with the specific, slightly artificial lilt of the time I love Matt McCoy, for instance, who plays the guy from "Badge of Honor" he looks and sounds like he could have stepped right out of "Dragnet."
To this day, I still think it's some of the best work Kevin Spacey and Russell Crowe have ever done. For me, Spacey's character is the heart of the film he's slick, witty, funny, and subtly, genuinely poignant as he begins to discover his conscience. And it's absolutely the best work Kim Basinger has ever done, as well.
So for me, the movie's still a gem. I love that the clothes, the houses, the little touches, are all so period-perfect. To me it remains one of the richest, most surprising homages to film noir ever made. I'll never forget seeing it in the theatre with a full house the audience gasped at the "Rollo Tommasi" scene, and applauded when it was over.I keep thinking I'm a grownup, but I'm not. -
mobocracy — 9 years ago(December 02, 2016 09:00 AM)
Well-done period films seem to have a timeless quality about them that makes it hard for them to age poorly.
If I had a criticism of it related to its era of origin, I would say that it comes across too soft and not hard-boiled enough relative to more contemporary detective films like True Detective.
Ellroy's books are really intense everything from violence, racism, corruption, drug use is turned up to about 12 on a 1-10 scale. I think the producers made significant reductions in these elements to get the film made in 1997. Keeping these elements at the level of intensity portrayed in the book probably wasn't possible then and may not even be now, at least for a theater distributed film.
I think with the public reception and acclaim for many HBO or other pay cable shows which were more intense in recent years it might be possible to make an LA Confidential thematically truer to the book today, especially as an HBO series.
I'd really like to see Ellroy's LA Noir trio made as a 3 season HBO series it would allow the intensity of his novels to be played true to the books and enough running time to fully portray his complex plotlines and characters without some of the shortcuts and changes necessary for a ~120 minute runtime.
My only other criticism of this film isn't about how its aged, but often it doesn't seem true to its era somehow. It seems to come off feeling a little too staged, too obvious its modern actors playing at being in the 1950s. -
ms_laling — 9 years ago(December 05, 2016 09:01 PM)
i think since Hansons dead there has been some confusion about Ellroy blaiming him for killing of Dudley Smith.
Ellroy understod the logic of the movie and that for the movie to be true to itself Exly had to kill Smith in the ending.
the people he blaimed in the aftermath of the movies release was producers agents who had aquirred the rights to use on a movie screne all names mentioned in his own book,making it totally impossible for him to go forward with scripts for the 2 other books in the narrative.
..and then of course he apparntly took it very personel when Nick Nolte stabbed him in the back after his agent had secured the right to White Jazz and then he ran out on the deal to make a Ellroy rip of.