Mulholland Falls [DVD]

The true star of Mullholland Falls is, of course, the 1949 Buick Roadmaster. Was any car ever more aptly named? Sleek, chrome-laden, portholes, rich enamel and even richer leather, this car just oozes the 50’s glamour that Nick Nolte does not. Nolte is, needless to say, no Brando. But he sure does hard-bitten well. Of all the hard-bitten cynical cops in cinema, he’s right up there with Russel Crowe. When a mobster needs black-jacking, Nolte’s the man you want.Another inanimate star, the brilliant Los Angeles sunshine, has seldom been better captured on film. Everything is clear, sharp, illuminated, L.A. looks just fine in yellow-filtered nostalgic hues.I’ve watched more than a few bad movies just because John Malkovich was in them. I’d watch Malkovich read Chinese restaurant menus for an hour. Here, with an inexplicable white crewcut, he’s fine as the dissipated Oppenheimer stand-in. Chazz Palminteri gets all the best lines, as garrulous as Nolte is tactiturn. Michael Madsen and especially Jennifer Connelly are mostly background figures; Melanie Griffith gets a lot of speeches but she’s really overwrought. Acts her heart out, but too much heart.The plot, of course, makes no sense whatever. Relying on the most improbable of coincidences, Nolte and Malkovich turn out to be Eskimo Brothers; the Hat Squad heads out to what must be the lowest security Army base in the west, where they can drive the splendid Buick around the back country unseen and unmolested in what you’d expect would be a fairly closely guarded site. A site where Jennifer Connelly was apparently able to wander about the base with a movie camera, filming whatever took her fancy. Including the secret ward with no doctors or nurses or orderlies hanging about. Bit odd, that.And would the nefarious Colonel and his minion really figure to dispose of Nick and Chazz by tossing them out of an airplane? Didn’t the discovery of the first pancake corpse in the desert start all this investigating? And we’ve already been told that an atomic test is about to take place. What better way to get rid of an inconvenient snoop than vaporizing him in a nuclear detonation? Plus, we movie-goers are, at this point, kind of looking forward to seeing an A-Bomb going off.We do get an absolutely wonderful C-47 crash landing, though. I have to think this was a practical effect, too, not the CGI we’d get now. It looked great! Kudos for that crash.Also kudos for the sheer number of cigarettes offered, lit, smoked, discarded, gestured with and thrown down in disgust. I like a movie with a lot of smoking, and this is one of those. You could make a great drinking game of that. One shot of Jaeger for every Lucky Strike? Plus, hats. I loved the bit where the survivors put their fedoras on the unlucky Chazz’s coffin. Except Nolte, who’s too tough for sentimental gestures. He keeps his hat screwed firmly on while me makes gruff apologies to Melanie Griffith, a hard man to the end.In summary, a wonderfully filmed if slightly ridiculous tribute to the glory days of tough cops in seedy L.A., where every desk drawer has a bottle of rye and a blackjack across the occiput is preferable to an indictment. Where you can send a cheap gunsel on a one-way trip down the mountain and then go home and smoke a carton of Pall Malls with the wife you’re cheating on. Iron men with Chesterfields in one hand and .45’s in the other.

The story, the director, cast, all contribute to making this a classic noir mystery in my opinion. This is the second or third time I've seen this. I am a big fan of Nick Nolte. Some of his best here folks.See other 5 star reviews if you want critique specifics. As for me if you want to see an early '50's detective mystery film with all star leads and supporting cast, first rate writing and directing then here it is..........The very end is more like real life as well than a fairy tale all is forgiven.

If you've seen LA Confidential you might note the staging, period acoutrements, musical score and instrumentation are very, very similar in Mulholland Falls. The references to LA Police history are alike and involve willingness to employ extra-legal and unconstitutional expedients and violence by a crew of vigilante sworn officers. There are even a reference or two to fictionalized characters from LA Confidential.Notwithstanding the similarities this film stands on its own. The story-line goes to the secrecy, carelessness and paranoia of the early US nuclear weapons programs. The Cast is outstanding. Nolte is greeat -as always. Add to his work a wonderfully sensitive performance from Melanie Griffith, a perfect supporting turn from Bruce Dern and strong performances from the rest of the distinguishes cast. A heck of a good period movie.

Mulholland Falls (1996) is a period piece neo-noir, I understand it did poorly with critics and at the box office and was overshadowed by L.A. Confidential. Movie is about four LAPD detectives, based on the real life Hat Squad, who only answered to the police chief and do lots of lawbreaking in upholding the law.Usually the squad roughs up gangsters, mob bosses from Chicago or elsewhere back east, but the squad gets involved in a murder of a woman the leader of the squad knows (the leader Detective Lieutenant Maxwell Hoover, played by a gravely voiced Nick Nolte, the woman Allison Pond, played by Jennifer Connelly). Her death is mysterious and it isn't obvious at first to anyone else Hoover knew Allison Pond, though he was having an affair with her. Investigating her murder takes the squad all the way to Nevada and a cover up at the Nevada Test Site involving the military.I liked the element with the Nevada Test Site and how that tied in with Allison's murder, that was interesting. I thought the movie was well cast, I liked the music, the period details, and the penultimate scene was very exciting. Though I think they were underused, Connelly and Melanie Griffith as Katherine Hoover, Max's wife, did a great job. Even though Allison is dead at the start of the film we see her a lot in flashbacks.I thought the actual mystery was a bit thin at times and the squad should have at least figured out the how of Allison's death very early on. The coverup, for all the role the atomic bomb program played, was actually in some ways mundane. I liked the squad but two of the characters didn't have much of a presence. One did, Detective Ellery Coolidge played by Chazz Palminteri, I liked his character. The movies is vague on just how far apart L.A. and the Nevada Test Site, making them seem rather close, but this is a very small point.I liked it. It's worth watching

Perfect

Great crime drama.

Acheté de lasermovie d'occasion, état très bon. Bon prix. DVD et emballage en excellente condition. Livré très rapidement. Très satisfait.

très bon polard secret défense, se passe dans les années 1950, bons acteurs

Una delle più belle colonne sonore scritte dal maestro Grusin (I 3 giorni del Condor, Il Laureato, Destini incrociati e molte altre).

superb I have watched this movie at least a dozen times , it is often confusing as people mistake it for Mullholland Drive and find a gem in their error.

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