Mulholland Falls
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| Mulholland Falls | |
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 Theatrical Poster |
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| Directed by | Lee Tamahori |
| Produced by | Lili Fini Zanuck Richard D. Zanuck |
| Written by | Story: Pete Dexter Floyd Mutrux Screenplay: Pete Dexter |
| Starring | Nick Nolte Jennifer Connelly Chazz Palminteri |
| Music by | Dave Grusin |
| Cinematography | Haskell Wexler |
| Editing by | Sally Menke |
| Distributed by | MGM |
| Release date(s) | April 26, 1996 |
| Running time | 107 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Allmovie profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Mulholland Falls (1996) is an American neo-noir drama film directed by Lee Tamahori. The drama features Nick Nolte, Jennifer Connelly, Chazz Palminteri, Michael Madsen, Chris Penn, Melanie Griffith, among others.[1]
Nolte plays Max Hoover, the head of an elite group of four Los Angeles Police Department detectives (based on the real life "Hat Squad") who are known for stopping at nothing to maintain control of their jurisdiction. Their work is under the tacit approval of the LAPD Chief.
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[edit] Plot
This film starts in the early 1950s with the squad of unorthodox LAPD detectives throwing Jack Flynn (William L. Petersen), a suspected organized crime figure, off a cliff on Mulholland Drive, nicknamed "Mulholland Falls" for all the men they have thrown off it.
Detective Maxwell Hoover (Nick Nolte) and his men are called to investigate a suspicious death of a young lady found at a construction site. It turns out the victim is the beautiful Allison Pond (Jennifer Connelly), a once aspiring actress with whom Max once had an affair. The evidence shows that every bone in her body is broken. A coroner deduces that she looks like she "jumped off a cliff," although there were no cliffs nearby.
The detectives find film of Allison having sex taken by a secretly hidden camera behind a one-way mirror. Allison's gay friend Jimmy Fields (Andrew McCarthy) admits to making this film and more, but he is murdered before he can testify, apparently as part of a conspiracy.
Radioactive glass is found in Allison's foot, which leads the detectives to the Nevada Atomic Testing Site, where they illegally break in and investigate. Colonel Fitzgerald (Treat Williams) threatens to lock up the police officers, warning them that they have no authority here.
The man in the film with Allison proves to be the civilian commander of the secret base, General Thomas Timms, now head of the Atomic Energy Commission, played by John Malkovich. Max's marriage to Kate (Melanie Griffith) and his professional life are jeopardized by someone desperate to retrieve the film.
Further investigation leads the detectives to the "atomic soldiers" used as guinea pigs for A-Bomb tests, now dying en masse in a secret military hospital. Images of them also were captured on film made by Allison's friend.
As Max and his partner Ellery Coolidge (Chazz Palminteri) get close to the truth, they nearly end up just like Allison, thrown out of a DC-3 by Colonel Fitzgerald and one of his aides, who are intent on keeping top-secret the radioactive fallout and the General's film. In a vicious struggle, the detectives fight for their lives during a shoot-out on the plane. The pilot is fatally shot but manages to crash land. Detective Coolidge dies of a bullet wound after surviving the crash.
Max cannot reconcile with his wife at the funeral because she feels betrayed and heartbroken after having been anonymously sent a copy of another film, this one depicting Allison and her husband making love. At the cemetery, she walks out on Max for good.
[edit] Background
The film is loosely based on LAPD's Robbery-Homicide Division's (the two units were merged in 1969) "Hat Squad" were in real life the elite of the least-corrupt detective division in any major city in the United States during the 1950s and early 1960s. While many of their tactics would not pass legal muster today, during the years of the "Hat Squad" their tactics and techniques were not only quasi-legal, but relatively tame when compared to those of more "mature" police departments in the Midwest and Northeast. These were the days before the 1966 Miranda Supreme Court decision and "reading him his rights" came along.
Yet, the only relationship to the true-life "Hat Squad" was the name. Mulholland Falls calls the squad of cops charged with suppressing organized crime the "Hat Squad", but the detail responsible for combating organized crime, in fact, was the "Organized Crime Intelligence Division" (OCID), run by Captain James Hamilton from the late 1940s through the early 1960s, when it was taken over by future LAPD Chief Daryl Gates.
[edit] Film noir look
Director of Photography, Haskell Wexler, creates a look that is visually sparse and shaded to emphasize the lurid and angular which is typical of the film noir style done in the 1940s and 1950s.
[edit] Film locations
Filming locations include Los Angeles, Malibu, and Desert Hot Springs, all in California; and Wendover, Utah.
[edit] Cast
- Nick Nolte as Maxwell Hoover
- Jennifer Connelly as Allison Pond
- Chazz Palminteri as Elleroy Coolidge
- Michael Madsen as Eddie Hall
- Chris Penn as Arthur Relyea
- Melanie Griffith as Katherine Hoover
- Treat Williams as Colonel Nathan Fitzgerald
- Daniel Baldwin as FBI Agent McCafferty
- Andrew McCarthy as Jimmy Fields
- John Malkovich as General Thomas Timms
- Kyle Chandler as Captain
- Bruce Dern as LAPD Chief
- William L. Petersen as Jack Flynn
- Rob Lowe as Flynn's Associate
- Aaron Neville as Nite Spot Singer
- Louise Fletcher as Esther
[edit] Critical reception
The Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert, historically a fan of film noir, liked the film, and wrote, "This is the kind of movie where every note is put in lovingly. It's a 1950s crime movie, but with a modern, ironic edge: The cops are just a shade over the top, just slightly in on the joke. They smoke all through the movie, but there's one scene where they're disturbed and thoughtful, and they all light up and smoke furiously, the smoke lit by the cinematographer to look like great billowing clouds, and you smile, because you know the scene is really about itself."[2]
Kenneth Turan, the Los Angeles Times film critic, also liked the film. Even though he writes that Mulholland Falls "goes about its business without a trace of finesse" he approved of the direction and the acting in the film, especially Jennifer Connelly's "haunting presence," writing, "Mulholland Falls combines a vivid sense of place with a visceral directorial style that fuses controlled fury onto everything it touches."[3]
And, film critic for The New York Times, Janet Maslin also lauded the film, writing, "Mr. Tamahori, who gives Mulholland Falls a smashing, insidious L.A.-noir style meant to recall Chinatown, along with a high-testosterone swagger that is distinctively his own. This director's first Hollywood film has such punch, in fact, that it takes a while to realize how slight and sometimes noxious its concerns really are. But Mulholland Falls is so well cast and relentlessly stylish (thanks to some fine technical talent assembled here) that its sheer energy prevails over its shaky plot. After all, when a film maker can show Ms. Griffith contentedly reading A Farewell to Arms, there's not much he won't do. So this film has all the Chinatown staples -- dangerous sex, corrupt power and a vast environment-damaging conspiracy -- along with mushroom clouds, porn movies, a crash-landing airplane and many quick bursts of one-on-one violence."[4]
However, many reviewers echoed critic Peter Stack. Writing for the San Francisco Chronicle, he notes, "Mulholland Falls falls flat a lot. The best of the old noir detective dramas had lively pacing and crisp tough-guy dialogue. This movie seems at times like an exercise in slow motion and in dull, cumbersome writing (the script is by Pete Dexter, who wrote the Rush screenplay)."[5]
The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 25% of critics gave the film a positive review, based on 25 reviews."[6]
[edit] Distribution
The producers used the following tagline when marketing the film:
- This isn't America, this is Los Angeles.
The film opened in wide release in the United States on April 26, 1996. The box office receipts were poor. The first week's gross was $4,306,221 (1,625 screens) and the total receipts for the run were $11,504,190. In its widest release the film was featured in 1,625 theaters. The film was in circulation seven weeks (45 days).[7]
[edit] Release dates
The film opened in wide release in the United States on April 26, 1996. In other English speaking countries the film opened:
[edit] Video and DVD releases
On September 18, 1996, the film was released on video by MGM/UA Home Video. A laserdisc edition was released on May 27, 1997. In addition, it was re-released on DVD on November 2, 2004 and contains the original theatrical trailer.
[edit] Soundtrack
The original score for the film was written and recorded by Dave Grusin.
An original motion picture soundtrack CD was released on May 21, 1996 on the Edel America label.
The CD contained 13 tracks including the old ballad, "Harbor Lights," by Jimmy Kennedy and Hugh Williams, sung by crooner Aaron Neville. Neville also performs the song in the film. There were five top 10 recordings of the song in 1950.
Music in film not in soundtrack
- Dean Martin - "That Certain Party"
- Count Basie - "Who Me?"
- Kay Starr - "So Tired"
[edit] Unsolicited awards
Wins
- Razzie Awards: Worst Supporting Actress, Melanie Griffith; 1997.
[edit] Noted quote
- Hoover: This is L.A., this is my town. Out here you're a trespasser; out here, I can pick you up, burn your house, fuck your wife, and kill your dog! And the only thing protecting you is if I can't find you, and I already found you!
[edit] References
- ^ Mulholland Falls at the Internet Movie Database.
- ^ Ebert, Roger. The Chicago Sun-Times, film review, April 26, 1996.
- ^ Turan, Kenneth. The Los Angeles Times, Calendar Section, film review, April 26, 1996.
- ^ Maslin, Janet. The New York Times, film review, "High-Test Swagger by Burly Buddies," April 26, 1996. Last accessed: March 21 [[2008.
- ^ Stack, Peter. The San Francisco Chronicle, film review, page D-3, April 26, 1996.
- ^ Mulholland Falls at Rotten Tomatoes. Last accessed: March 21, 2008.
- ^ The Numbers box office data. Last accessed: December 16, 2006.
[edit] External links
- Mulholland Falls at the Internet Movie Database.
- Mulholland Falls at Allmovie.
- Mulholland Falls at the TCM Movie Database.
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