THIEF
James Caan, Tuesday Weld, Robert Prosky, James Belushi. Dir. Michael Mann, United Artists, 1981Is Michael Mann's first film, 1981's THIEF, better than his 1995 LA Noir epic HEAT? I don't know. Is Canadian whiskey better than bourbon? And does it matter?
I took an unplanned 40 year break between viewings of THIEF. I loved it first on Movie Channel in 1982, and fell back in love with my next two watches, ten days ago & yesterday.
Rewarding myself for a few months of budget discipline I treated myself to the Criterion Collection bluray & two-day delivery at the start of March. It's one of the best presents I've given myself. That comes from a guy who has taken delivery of THE GETAWAY, NETWORK, ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN, THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR, THE CONVERSATION, MAGNOLIA & HATEFUL EIGHT in the last few weeks. In between, I've rewatched BOOGIE NIGHTS, SEA OF LOVE, THE LAST DETAIL, & DONNIE BRASCO, to give a full basis of comparison. Great fuckin' movies have not been scarce around here of late.
I am overdue to write up most of the above, but HEAT gets to line jump. It's that good. Ever loath to call a picture "perfect," I don't know what other word to use in its case. It's that rare film which refreshes the most shopworn cliches.
I am overdue to write up most of the above, but HEAT gets to line jump. It's that good. Ever loath to call a picture "perfect," I don't know what other word to use in its case. It's that rare film which refreshes the most shopworn cliches.
"An elemental story." "Character driven." "Sleek & stylish." "The score's almost a character, itself." That's it, everyone. G'nite.
Given my dislike of "perfect" I'll say it the long way: there is no part of THIEF I do not like, nothing about it I would change. It is impeccably cast, imaculately composed, lit, & shot, hypnotically scored, and if it oozes style - & it does - it's never gratuitous, never intrusive or a distracting.
Which is simple &, like many simple things, elegant. James Caan plays Frank, an ex-con-turned-safecracker who invests his profits in legitimate business, a used car lot & a bar. When Frank's fence, and Frank's $185k from a diamond heist, take an involuntary walk out of a high window, it leads to a meet with Chicago gangster Robert Prosky's Leo, who wants Frank to work for him. He offers generous terms, makes all the right promises, but the independent-minded Frank reacts warily.
Conflict: Frank's criminal tutor, Okla - a mesmerizing Willie Nelson - still imprisoned, has a failing heart & wants to die on the outside, requiring someone who can afford to bribe the right judge. At the same time, Frank has that most hackneyed movie-criminal ambition - pull one last score & get out of the life, get married, have a family and the whole domestic-bliss dream. One job for Leo would pay for Frank's exit, so he signs on. Needless to say, Leo has other ideas & the equally cliched complications ensue, leading to a bloody, unforgettable resolution that I consider one of the best climactic sequences I've seen.
When I was 14 I earned money around the neighborhood babysitting. My favorite client, a recent widower with three sugared-up boys aged 6, 8, & 10, had me come over at 5 p.m. then stayed out until 5 a.m. every Friday. In 1982 dollars a $30 - $40 night bought a lot of records & movie tickets. I first watched THIEF at his house deep inside one of those Friday nights, the boys asleep, entranced. No trips to the kitchen for Cokes, no channel surfing over to Night Flight to see if something cooler was on, not thinking about anything but the action on the screen, not even moving. It's good the boys slept like the dead because I forgot myself and shouted, "God DAMN!" as THIEF concluded.
Like HEAT, THIEF gets over not on Mann's proto-Miami Vice visual aesthetic alone but on his characters & story. His simplicity deceives. What looks like a superficial, conventional B-movie plot reveals unexpected depth, thanks to a cast of vivid, rich characters, spearheaded by Caan's Frank, a man whose reach exceeds his grasp, a closed & mistrustful veteran of foster homes & prison trying to find his version of the American Dream.
Given my dislike of "perfect" I'll say it the long way: there is no part of THIEF I do not like, nothing about it I would change. It is impeccably cast, imaculately composed, lit, & shot, hypnotically scored, and if it oozes style - & it does - it's never gratuitous, never intrusive or a distracting.
Which is simple &, like many simple things, elegant. James Caan plays Frank, an ex-con-turned-safecracker who invests his profits in legitimate business, a used car lot & a bar. When Frank's fence, and Frank's $185k from a diamond heist, take an involuntary walk out of a high window, it leads to a meet with Chicago gangster Robert Prosky's Leo, who wants Frank to work for him. He offers generous terms, makes all the right promises, but the independent-minded Frank reacts warily.
Conflict: Frank's criminal tutor, Okla - a mesmerizing Willie Nelson - still imprisoned, has a failing heart & wants to die on the outside, requiring someone who can afford to bribe the right judge. At the same time, Frank has that most hackneyed movie-criminal ambition - pull one last score & get out of the life, get married, have a family and the whole domestic-bliss dream. One job for Leo would pay for Frank's exit, so he signs on. Needless to say, Leo has other ideas & the equally cliched complications ensue, leading to a bloody, unforgettable resolution that I consider one of the best climactic sequences I've seen.
When I was 14 I earned money around the neighborhood babysitting. My favorite client, a recent widower with three sugared-up boys aged 6, 8, & 10, had me come over at 5 p.m. then stayed out until 5 a.m. every Friday. In 1982 dollars a $30 - $40 night bought a lot of records & movie tickets. I first watched THIEF at his house deep inside one of those Friday nights, the boys asleep, entranced. No trips to the kitchen for Cokes, no channel surfing over to Night Flight to see if something cooler was on, not thinking about anything but the action on the screen, not even moving. It's good the boys slept like the dead because I forgot myself and shouted, "God DAMN!" as THIEF concluded.
Like HEAT, THIEF gets over not on Mann's proto-Miami Vice visual aesthetic alone but on his characters & story. His simplicity deceives. What looks like a superficial, conventional B-movie plot reveals unexpected depth, thanks to a cast of vivid, rich characters, spearheaded by Caan's Frank, a man whose reach exceeds his grasp, a closed & mistrustful veteran of foster homes & prison trying to find his version of the American Dream.
Material status represents a means to end, though. Frank's real dream is to feel the way he believes others feel. Not to live with constant fear, emotions buried, in a heightened state of tension and awareness 24/7 but to love others and feel secure enough to be bored. Imagine a life where a boring weekend at home with the family appears paradisical.
Frank's opposite, Leo, prizes what Frank accomplishes in all-fear-all-tension-all-the-time mode & wants to keep him there, by any means necessary. He tries the carrot - keeping the Chicago PD off Frank's back & arranging an unofficial adoption for Frank & Tuesday Weld's Jesse, who struggles to trust feeling for her own reasons.
Frank's opposite, Leo, prizes what Frank accomplishes in all-fear-all-tension-all-the-time mode & wants to keep him there, by any means necessary. He tries the carrot - keeping the Chicago PD off Frank's back & arranging an unofficial adoption for Frank & Tuesday Weld's Jesse, who struggles to trust feeling for her own reasons.
When the carrot fails, Leo goes to the stick, which he wields to catastrophic effect. Chicago actor Robert Prosky replaced Michael Conrad on HILL STREET BLUES around the time of THIEF, following Conrad's death, & I knew him in that context when I first watched THIEF. On HILL STREET, Prosky played a crusty police veteran who closed briefings with "Let's do it ta dem before dey do it ta us." A genially violent presence on the show, Prosky plays Leo as demonic, the sum of evil as Frank understands the word. 49 years old, in his movie debut, Prosky embodies greed & lies, a satanic snake oil salesman. He tells one of the film's great truths, "It's not the kid's fault if their parent's an asshole," in service of the larger lie he uses to seduce Frank. He doesn't steal the movie, and he doesn't try. He simply leaves it all on set, making himself unforgettable. It's the performance of movie star in his prime, not the debut of a late starter.
Every member of Mann's cast plays up to the standard set by Caan & Prosky, from John Santucci's smarmily savage Detective Yorizzi to Tuesday Weld's Jesse, a woman reluctant to trust until she does & then trusts all the way.
Every member of Mann's cast plays up to the standard set by Caan & Prosky, from John Santucci's smarmily savage Detective Yorizzi to Tuesday Weld's Jesse, a woman reluctant to trust until she does & then trusts all the way.
Willie Nelson, as Frank's mentor, namesake of Frank & Jesse's baby, has two scenes, only one with dialogue. What he does with face, eyes, & voice in his few minutes rivals Prosky. He has this presence, fully in the moment, I can't see enough. James/Jim Belushi turns in one of his best performances as Frank's partner-in-crime/friend, Barry. Look for early parts for Dennis Farina, & William Petersen in two roles.
Like HEAT, THIEF's set pieces exist in the same rarefied air as its performances and, also like HEAT, turns intimate conversations in diners into emotional set pieces as satisfying as the safecracking & shootouts. When Frank proposes, in his way, to Jesse over coffee, it's impossible not to think of Pacino & DeNiro's meetup in the '95 film. Caan & Weld lay out the movie's emotional core in one halting conversation, Caan cocky one moment & vulnerable the next. Much as I love James Caan in THE GODFATHER, THIEF is his definitive performance.
The Criterion Collection's bluray looks as good as I would expect, nowhere moreso than in a scene not shrouded in shadow but bathed in dawn light, as Frank & an early fisherman watch the sun rise over Lake Michigan. Shot from behind, both actors in silhouette, lavender-gray dawnlight pours from the screen. It's as lovely a shot as I can think of over Mann's filmography, a moment of unexpected serenity. I'm not a brand worshiping guy, I don't think, but Criterion Collection releases prove exceptional. For a movie like THIEF, they justify the higher cost.
Is THIEF better than HEAT, though? Couldn't avoid the question by doubting its relevance. Darn. I don't think it is. HEAT's story, with its multiple storylines & bigger, more-impeccable cast, explores its themes with greater depth. THIEF has the nervy vision and energy of a young filmmaker trying to get every idea onscreen, because who knows if he'll get another chance, an infectious and addicting energy. It's the difference of Canadian whiskey & bourbon. Both get you there in a great mood. They just taste different.
Afterthought.
If readers rated these writeups I think I earned a C+, maaaaybe a B-. I'm scoring myself low because I spent four hours writing this & said nothing about Tangerine Dream's synthrock score, even as I've heard it my head all this time. If not actually a separate character, it's synonymous with THIEF. One can't mention the picture without mentioning Tangerine Dream. Yet I just did. That's worth at least one letter-grade.
Like HEAT, THIEF's set pieces exist in the same rarefied air as its performances and, also like HEAT, turns intimate conversations in diners into emotional set pieces as satisfying as the safecracking & shootouts. When Frank proposes, in his way, to Jesse over coffee, it's impossible not to think of Pacino & DeNiro's meetup in the '95 film. Caan & Weld lay out the movie's emotional core in one halting conversation, Caan cocky one moment & vulnerable the next. Much as I love James Caan in THE GODFATHER, THIEF is his definitive performance.
The Criterion Collection's bluray looks as good as I would expect, nowhere moreso than in a scene not shrouded in shadow but bathed in dawn light, as Frank & an early fisherman watch the sun rise over Lake Michigan. Shot from behind, both actors in silhouette, lavender-gray dawnlight pours from the screen. It's as lovely a shot as I can think of over Mann's filmography, a moment of unexpected serenity. I'm not a brand worshiping guy, I don't think, but Criterion Collection releases prove exceptional. For a movie like THIEF, they justify the higher cost.
Is THIEF better than HEAT, though? Couldn't avoid the question by doubting its relevance. Darn. I don't think it is. HEAT's story, with its multiple storylines & bigger, more-impeccable cast, explores its themes with greater depth. THIEF has the nervy vision and energy of a young filmmaker trying to get every idea onscreen, because who knows if he'll get another chance, an infectious and addicting energy. It's the difference of Canadian whiskey & bourbon. Both get you there in a great mood. They just taste different.
Afterthought.
If readers rated these writeups I think I earned a C+, maaaaybe a B-. I'm scoring myself low because I spent four hours writing this & said nothing about Tangerine Dream's synthrock score, even as I've heard it my head all this time. If not actually a separate character, it's synonymous with THIEF. One can't mention the picture without mentioning Tangerine Dream. Yet I just did. That's worth at least one letter-grade.
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