frankm@microsoft.UUCP (Frank MALONEY) (05/16/91)
ONE GOOD COP
A film review by Frank Maloney
Copyright 1991 Frank Maloney
ONE GOOD COP is a movie starring Michael Keaton. It also features
Rene Russo.
I was disturbed by this superficially likable film. I have enjoyed
Michael Keaton's screen presence since BEETLEJUICE and I am intrigued by
the range he is capable of, going from that zaniness to CLEAN AND SOBER
in the same summer. I liked Rene Russo, who was a supermodel in
Seventies and shows every sign that unlike most ex-models she can
actually act and more than competently, too. I like the three little
girls who are suddenly thrust into the adults' comfortable lives by the
death of Keaton's police partner.
I liked the way Keaton's character, Lewis, could be strong and
tough with the bad guys and still warm and loving with his wife, the
girls, and his partner, whom he exuberantly kisses on the cheek on a
park bench. I liked the moral outrage he feels towards the bad guy,
Beniamino the iceman, who drives a red Rolls-Royce, while a neighborhood
Catholic church is packed with homeless people.
But then we get into the crux of the story and my admiration turns
into discomfort. Lewis rips off Beniamino, buys a house so he can keep
the girls, gives the rest to the church, gets captured and tortured,
winds up slaughtering the bad guys, and getting off completely. The
story apparently thinks this is okay. I'm afraid I don't. One good cop
turned into one bad cop and the resolution stinks of either moral
corruption or bad writing. I'll go with bad writing in view of the
secular nature of my forum.
The writers and the director, whose names are not in any of the
display ads in front of me, were either too lazy or too contemptuous of
the audience to find a better resolution, a better ending than to return
Lewis to the force and to his family.
As a result, I cannot recommend ONE GOOD COP except with the most
extreme reservations. Bad writing should not be supported, no matter
how much we like the stars, because we will just see more of this kind
of sloppiness and we are already drowning in a sea of sleaze.
(Moral outrage -- sorry, it's hard to hold it in, I might wind up
hurting myself; bad writing is immoral.)
(And please, friends, don't write me to remind that this is just a
movie and to lighten up. I don't need cliches on top of sleaze and
slop.)
--
Frank Richard Aloysius Jude Maloney