***1/2 (out of ****)
Starring Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon, Laurence Fishburne, Laura Linney, and Marcia Gay Harden
Directed by Clint Eastwood & written for the screen by Brian Helgeland, from the novel by Dennis Lehane
2003
137 min R
Dozen-or-So Best Films of 2003
The story is familiar, even pulpy. A police detective (Kevin Bacon) comes back to the old neighborhood to investigate the disappearance of an old friend’s (Sean Penn) daughter, while another boyhood chum (Tim Robbins) becomes a suspect. Secrets emerge from the past, including connections with organized crime, and the code of silence which has long covered the Irish enclave tightens. But God is found in the details, and details are where we find the power of director Clint Eastwood’s “Mystic River,” a film that examines guilt, vengeance, and the endurance of evil, but, the more I think about it, is really about a man’s role in a family.
The three old friends say “hi” to each other around the neighborhood. They say things like “we should get a beer sometime.” But they aren’t really friends anymore. “Mystic River” begins with a scene that has no direct relation to the investigation of the missing girl, but which informs everything that comes after it and hovers over it all. As boys, one of the three friends was tricked into the car of two pedophiles, while the other two watched them drive slowly away. Four days later, after he had escaped, the friendship among the three was essentially ended. Did the two lucky boys blame the unlucky one, call him stupid, accuse him of being a willing participant? No, they simply couldn’t go near that much pain, and that unknown, broken thing they knew their friend had become. The symbolism of their names, unfinished in the cement of the sidewalk, is not hard to spot: here their lives have stopped.
Years later the missing girl tests each man to his core. Sean Penn, Kevin Bacon, and Tim Robbins are among the finest actors working today and none of them gives a one-note performance. No phrase describes Penn’s appearance and demeanor more than “I’ve been in prison,” and here he plays a tattooed ex-con that has become a shopkeeper and devoted family man. Listen to how heartbreakingly he delivers the line “that’s my daughter’s car,” watch his response to his father-in-law’s advice to look after his family. Penn is a gentle, good father, yet can also convince himself that incredible acts of viciousness are justifiable. As for Robbins, who comes home dripping with blood the night Penn’s daughter disappears, watch his face as he later listens to Penn bemoaning his loss. He is a quivering, lonely man, but has a moment of chess-player brilliance, a seizing of a golden opportunity, that sometimes comes to quiet men, and allows him to outsmart Kevin Bacon’s weary detective.
In a moment of rare venom, he accuses Bacon of being his police partner’s “bitch,” an instantaneous emasculation that hits Bacon with almost clairvoyant intensity. Bacon’s own pregnant wife left him six months earlier, and he can think of nothing to do but listen to her breathing on the phone when she calls him. Marcia Gay Hardin (Oscar-winner for “Pollock”) has a hefty role as Robbins’ wife, who is at first supportive of him, then begins to doubt him. One night of blood does not ruin their marriage, and the movie hints throughout that he has simply not been a talkative husband or aggressive father. Penn, for all his shortcomings, is the best, strongest father figure.
Eastwood and screenwriter Brian Helgeland, who with Curtis Hanson won the screenwriting Oscar for “L.A. Confidential,” give “Mystic River” a straightforward feel and an observer’s eye. So there’s a bit of narrative unease when characters are more eloquent than usual, especially near the end when Penn’s wife (Laura Linney) gives a creepy, sotto voce justification for Penn’s actions. The chief responsibility of the head of a family, she seems to be saying, is not so much to manage efficiently, but to make the family feel he is wild with his love and passionate with his power. Vengeance need not be accurate as long as it is swift, terrible, and shows the family he is its knight in shining armor. Linney’s speech is one of the most frighteningly concise descriptions of traditional role of the family man. It is also eerily similar to militant America’s sweeping and mighty response to Iraq, whose purpose and propriety are open for debate, but whose show of strength is unquestionable.
“Mystic River’s” power is derived from its slow pace and attention to detail. Like “In the Bedroom,” 2001’s stunning piece about familial loss, “Mystic River” is all about delicate, true moments, not big melodramatic scenes. Our setting is working class Boston, which could easily be Pittsburgh, Chicago, Cleveland, or any other northern industrial metropolis. The movie’s look is all overcast skies, duplexes that have been in the same families for generations, chipping paint, small yards of drooping grass, yellowed wallpaper, creaking floorboards, and sitting rooms lit by windows that don’t let in much light. As a gritty, rambling slice of life, some characters show up for only a scene or two and some are kept silently in the background, in that way old acquaintances appear to mourn at a funeral but are never the stars. Not every story thread is seen to its very end, and some are either so subtle that they come out of nowhere, like Laura Linney’s surprisingly Machiavellian speech, or perhaps belong to a thread that was cut from the final screenplay.
The movie’s many strands are tied together by the police investigation, headed by Kevin Bacon and his detective partner (Laurence Fishburne). Fishburne, who has recently dispensed so much profound gibberish in “The Matrix” films, is here detached, even a little playful, but with a reservoir of unbreakable gravity he can call upon whenever necessary. As the movie’s one and only outsider, he is indispensable in helping us keep our bearings. That said, “Mystic River’s” only shortcomings are its occasional, and probably forgivable, lapses into capital-A Acting and capital-M Music (the score is by no less than the Man With No Name himself).
“Mystic River” is not a symbolic movie, but it is open to numerous interpretations. Although it’s not nearly as obvious as in most movies, the three boys still have the same personalities when they are grown-up husbands and fathers. In the furnace of life, the strong get stronger and the weak get weaker, yet the good become better. Each is represented by one of the three boys. The follower has been beaten down and finally defeated. The leader might be shackled with guilt, but he keeps his head high for the sake of his family. But the good man, who would not steal a car as a child, who still says “I’m married” six months after his wife leaves him, maintains his moral high ground through to the end of the film and is rewarded. These are strong, sharply drawn personalities, very individualized, yet somewhat archetypal and strangely representative. Coming out of “Mystic River,” we may know a little more about how the world works, and how to spot life’s Sean Penns, Kevin Bacons, and Tim Robbinses.
Finished January 4, 2004
Copyright © 2004 Friday & Saturday Night
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