To Live and Die in L.A.
1985 Directed by William Friedkin
Synopsis
A Secret Service agent becomes obsessed with tracking down a notorious and dangerous Los Angeles counterfeitor.
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Friedkin firing on all cylinders. Gritty, sexy, and full of venom. Great, immersive camera work - those quick pans during the car chase are incredibly effective. Love the way Dafoe's character is introduced: his own (by Hollywood standards) impressionistic face contrasted with an impressionistic work of art.
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William Friedkin shoots L.A. like you've never seen it. That's cool.
But this 80's cop thriller is actually a bit dull thanks to a messy plot and a overly long runtime.
The cops descent in to hell through obsession with their work is a leftover trait from those awesome gritty 70s crime flicks but the shiny glitzy wang chung of this movie is all 80s. It has the Men In Black opening with the old guy saying he's too old for this shit a full year before Lethal Weapon chose it as a catchphrase. There's some real gory violence and some enjoyable performances from Petersen, Turturro and Dafoe but it's not enough to sustain entertainment throughout.
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A great L.A. movie, and one which avoids the obvious locations. This isn't the L.A. of wide boulevards, palm trees and glinting swimming pools, instead it's a dusty, sun-scorched world of warehouses, factories and dockland. The frequent shots of a blistering Californian landscape under wide, darkening skies of hazy ash-blue or orange, puts To Live and Die in L.A. firmly in Michael Mann territory, and this very 1985 cop thriller does come across like a grimier, Los Angeles cousin of Miami Vice.
William Friedkin clearly wanted to make a West Coast answer to the New York of his greatest work, The French Connection. A place drained of its glamour and romance; dirtied and rotting from within, and peopled with tough,… -
This was a really difficult one. On the one hand, this film had a handful of great shots, great scenes, and great action set pieces (particularly the L.A. freeway chase). On the other hand, it has some of the most unlikable protagonists of any action movie I've ever seen. To call William L. Petersen's character a "hotshot" or a "loose cannon" is a gross understatement. Being cocky and unstable enough to stretch the very limits of what accounts for likability in a movie character, Petersen's avenging Secret Service agent is either really fearless or incredibly stupid. (Most of the times it's the latter.)
The overall annoyance in Petersen's behavior extends to the rest of the cast, save for the bad…
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Neo-noir in the '80s. This film invented most of the cop clichés, and it's still a lot of fun. The plot zips from moment to moment without much connective tissue. The car chase is amazing as are the bullet hits (I love a good gory '80s bullet hit). Good turns from William Peterson, the young Willem Dafoe, John Turturro, Dean Stockwell, and some other people. Too many of the plot strands never go anywhere for it to be truly great in my eyes, but the ending is amazing, almost transcendent.
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Feels like the purest display of Friedkin's pet theme of the law corrupted into that which it chases. William Peterson's Secret Service agent is grotesque from the start, and even his more wholesome replacement partner comes to inherit his decrepit soul. And of the endless stylistic flourishes, my favorite is the counterfeiting montage, with the printing press' rolling entwining with the backbeat of Wang Chung's song. Friedkin's seediness has never seemed more divine.
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Thought this had 2Pac in it.
The story could have been great, but was messy.
The dialogue was laughable at times.
A decent chase scene saved it.
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Friedkin firing on all cylinders. Gritty, sexy, and full of venom. Great, immersive camera work - those quick pans during the car chase are incredibly effective. Love the way Dafoe's character is introduced: his own (by Hollywood standards) impressionistic face contrasted with an impressionistic work of art.
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As pretty and violent as I remember it. More incoherant and coked up than I remembered it.
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This has always been on my mental rental list, as I remembered seeing it all through High School on the shelves at Blockbuster, but just never bit.
I was a very good crime thriller. I loved the cast, especially Petersen in an early role and Dafoe played such a good bad guy and not in the over the top way he does most roles these days. Pankow was a weak link, but I hated his character more so than the actor, as they made him such a wuss.
And an early Jane Leeves as a fellow stripper was fun to see. I don't even think she has one line though.I loved the early scene showing exactly how the fake…
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80s noir! Cop and criminal do their dance in a counterfeit world. The line is blurred and then breaks.
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Relentless primal momentum paper over the story and character cracks. They snorted in the 70's but the blow reacher their brains in the 80's. A pure example of Friedkin's vision in all its testosteronific glory.
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Very eighties. Predictable maverick lawmen antics for 90% of the film, then a killer plot twist, then spoils it all by trying to be even cleverer at the end and falling flat.
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Interesting plot points, Willem Dafoe, and a sweet Wang Chung soundtrack
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A simple film, but extremely compelling. Just remember, this movie is about John Pankow's character, whom he does an excellent job of portraying.