Movie Reviews

I read Dennis Lehane's novel, "Mystic River" a couple of months ago after hearing some really good things about the then-upcoming film adaptation by Clint Eastwood, but I was a little bit underwhelmed. It's essentially a crime drama, but what apparently captivated a lot of people about the book was the complex characterizations and difficult moral dilemmas that the main characters find themselves in. Mystic River the film follows book pretty closely: it starts off in 1975, with three young boys, Sean, Jimmy, and Dave. While playing in the street one day, two pedophiles drive up, posing as policemen, and convince Dave to get into their car. After a while, Dave manages to escape, but returns home as something of an outcast ("He's damaged goods, now," we hear someone say).

Flash forward about twenty-five years later: the three men still live live in the same neighbourhood, but have grown apart. The main story begins when Jimmy's daughter is brutally murdered. Jimmy (played by Sean Penn) has had a bit of a criminal past, and soon after getting over the initial shock of his loss, he and a few of his past 'associates' try to take matters into their own hands and find the killer. Sean (Kevin Bacon) has become a police detective, and he and his partner (played by Laurence Fishborne) are the lead investigators on the case. Dave (Tim Robbins) is married to Jimmy's cousin, and becomes implicated as the primary suspect in the murder.

It's a really interesting mix of people and circumstance. The story unfolds as if some greater power (well, the writer, I guess) decided to mix these characters up into as horrible a situation as is imagineable (the death of one's daughter), letting them loose to 'see what happens', with the extra complication that the three men where once friends -- until one of them was abducted and sexually abused. One of the small qualms I had with the book was that the whole scenerio seemed perhaps just a little too artificial and 'set up'. But again, the set up does make for some truly compelling payoffs. That the final conclusion involves a couple of large coincidences was also a little annoying, though not excessively so.

What let me down most about the book was that, despite the extra 'layers' that were apparently evident, I failed to see it as much more than an above-average crime drama. Eastwood's film, however, really took the story to another level. I think the most credit for this has to go the all of the actors, especially the three leads. For example, the pain and anger within Jimmy didn't jump out at me when I read the book, but Sean Penn really shows it. I've never been a huge fan of Penn, but he was excellent here.

Mystic River was a little tough to watch. It's brutally dark at times, and it ends on a note of real discomfort. But it's also exceptionally well-made and well-acted, and probably on of the best movies of the year.