Review of L.A. Confidential (1997) by Julien E — 22 May 2011

L.A. Confidential is a terrific film directed by Curtis Hanson and based on a novel written by James Ellroy. Three cops (Kevin Spacey, Russell Crowe, and Guy Pearce), a call girl (Kim Basinger), a mysterious millionaire (David Strathairn), a tabloid journalist (Danny DeVito), and the Chief of Detectives (James Cromwell) fuel a labyrinthine plot rife with mystery, ambition, romance and humour. The story kicks off when there is a battle consisting of cops against criminals in the middle of a bunch of holding cells. Some cops testify against others and some hand in badges because they didn't; it is from this that a multitude of unfortunate events begin to unravel and give all the characters grief. From the very beginning, I did not know what I loved the most in this - the directing, the story or the cast.

Curtis Hanson had only supplied me two films before this one and neither were spectacular nor were they awful. They were 8 Mile and In Her Shoes. L.A. Confidential on the other hand is nothing but amazing for just about everything in it. There is one main story in this as I explained earlier but one of the amazing things about this entire feature is the sub-stories that stray away from the main. The romances and various corruptions we see being good examples. My favourite story in the film was that between Kevin Spacey's and Danny DeVito's characters. Spacey showed great pride in being corrupt extremely well via feeding information to DeVito, a reporter. But overall, everything with the stories was done perfectly.

My favourite characters were in fact the three most major ones; Spacey, Pearce and Crowe but that is mainly because I love the three in so many other films like Memento and Gladiator. I do not think I am biased because of that when I say that they maintained the best characters and performances within the film, though, because they are great actors and the characters themselves had both great build-up and great stories. Amongst the other actors I thought were very good was James Cromwell. Now I only saw him before this as Captain Stacey in Spiderman 3 (ugh) but I thoroughly enjoyed him in this as the corrupt Chief of Detectives. Kim Basinger also gave a stunningly realistic portrayal as a call girl in this who fell in love with Crow. DeVito was good in this, but I do not think the film to enough advantage of having him.

Overall, this is a fantastic film which goes on for over two hours but never seems to run out of fantastic ideas. The cast line-up is one of the best I have ever seen in one cop film since I first got into films, and they were all given absolutely fantastic direction by Curtis Hanson who should be proud of having made a film as good as this. For me, this is yet another film that I would be infuriated over if a remake ever, ever, ever came into consideration by anyone - even someone like David Fincher. L.A. Confidential is what it is for its grisly realism and the fantastic story that it has carried into the depths of the film industry.