The rebirth of cool

On the surface, Narc sounds like the kind of flick that should be going
straight to either video or cable. I had never heard of the director (Joe
Carnahan), and the two leads (Jason Patric and Ray Liotta) are hardly the stuff
of dreams. So what am I missing here? Why the hell is this low-budget movie
getting one of those limited, Oscar-qualifying runs in late December before
opening nationwide in January alongside pictures like The Hours and About Schmidt?

            Now that I’ve seen Narc, everything makes sense. This flick
is the bomb. It belongs in the same company as the gritty ’70s police dramas
made by William Friedkin, Sidney Lumet, and Al Pacino. And that’s saying
something, considering those titles include films like The French Connection, Serpico,
Dog Day Afternoon, Panic in Needle Park, and Cruising. It seems like the hip thing to
do is hail Carnahan as the next Quentin Tarantino, and I guess that makes
sense. Like Tarantino, Carnahan is able to inject humor into even the most
unspeakably grisly of acts. But unlike the Pulp
Fiction director, he also incorporates several beautiful moments of
reflection that recall Steven Soderbergh’s quieter moments.

            The blending of equal parts Tarantino
and Soderbergh is reflected in Narc’s two leads, as well. Henry Oak (Liotta) is
a fiery Detroit Metro homicide detective who’d sooner administer a vicious
beating than leave things up to the legal system. On the flip side, undercover
officer Nick Tellis (Patric) is introspective and tranquil. Yet despite their
differences, each is, almost to a fault, dedicated to his job. Each also
encounters certain and seemingly unrelated administrative problems shortly
after Narc‘s blistering, mood-setting
opening scene.

            Tellis is serving the 18th month of
what appears to be an endless suspension following a shootout that involved a
stray bullet killing a civilian. Meanwhile, Oak’s best friend, an undercover
narcotics cop named Michael Calvess (Alan Van Sprang), has recently been
murdered in a deal gone south. There isn’t one lead, yet the brass won’t let
Oak near the investigation because of his “passionate” history. They
do want Tellis to work the case, though, and offer him full reinstatement if
he’s able to nab the perp with enough evidence to convict.

            Because he’s married and has both a
10-month-old kid and a history of drug abuse in his past (Is this the sequel to
Rush? He didn’t iron those track
marks away for nothing, you know), Tellis is reluctant to take anything but a
desk job. He eventually succumbs to the temptation of once again receiving a
full paycheck, but only if Oak is allowed to join his investigation. Before you
know it, the duo is whipping us through the seedy parts of Detroit, which
photographer Alex Nepomniaschy shoots to look just as cold and desolate as it
did in 8 Mile (even though it’s
really Toronto here). I won’t get too much into the story, but it does involve
lots of gunplay, lots of violence, a pants-less snitch with an uncomfortable
venereal disease, and a brief appearance by Busta Rhymes, who is barely recognizable
whilst covered in blood. And screaming.

            Aside from Chris Cooper in Adaptation, it’d be tough to name a
better, flashier 2002 performance than the one Liotta logs in here. Having
gained quite a few pounds (as well as lifts and padding) for the role, he
wasn’t immediately recognizable, and it quickly made me look at the actor in an
entirely different light. Sure, he’s done psycho before, but never psycho with
this much depth. Patric is almost Liotta’s equal (acting, not physically — he
looks like Lester to Liotta’s Willie Tyler) and is damn mesmerizing when he
isn’t unintentionally making you laugh by looking just like Ben Stiller’s
retirement-home slave driver from Happy
Gilmore.

            Here’s the deal with Carnahan: He
made a movie called Blood, Guts, Bullets
and Octane for $8,000 a few years ago. It was a quiet indie hit and put him
on the map as the next fill-in-the-blank (Tarantino, Kevin Smith, Robert
Rodriguez) in terms of being an up-and-coming writer-director. Carnahan made Narc for more money, but the budget was
still so tiny that he couldn’t afford to develop his film and look at dailies
during the 28-day shoot. If you happen to catch Tom Cruise’s name in the
credits, let it be known that he had nothing to do with the making of Narc. He did, however, help it gain
exposure and a wider distribution. Even if Cruise’s push doesn’t help Narc find a theatrical audience, it’s
destined to be a cult video hit and will make Carnahan’s next project very
eagerly anticipated.

The print ads
for Just Married trumpet the
film as “The first BIG comedy of the new year!” and for once the
studio isn’t lying. Married is,
officially, the first picture to be released in 2003, and the ad merely points
this out, albeit in giant block letters that scream for attention. This should
give you a pretty good idea of what the studio thinks of Hollywood’s New Year’s
baby. They didn’t stretch the truth and crow, “The funniest film of the
new year!” or “The year’s best picture!” but instead stuck with
the facts. The tagline may as well read, “Projected on a big white
screen!” or “Full of many scenes, edited together!”

            Now that I think about it, maybe the
studio’s ad isn’t telling the truth after all. I did manage to overlook one
word — “comedy.” Married is about as funny as Schindler’s List.
Every scene that had the potential to be the tiniest bit comical has already
been rubbed into the dirt via the film’s trailer and non-stop television
commercials. Not some of them — all of them. Like a ringworm (which is
neither a ring, nor a worm — it’s a fungus) Married is a romantic comedy that is neither romantic nor comedic.
If, instead of a feature film, Married was a UPN sitcom, it would be canceled faster than you could say Moesha.

            Married follows the tired old Boy Meets, Loses, Then Wins Back Girl flowchart,
deviating only slightly by showing the tail end of the losing in its opening
scene. We see Tom Leezak (Ashton Kutcher) and Sarah McNerney (Brittany Murphy)
going at it like they were in a post-pubescent version of The War of the Roses as they return to the US from what we can only
imagine was a horrifyingly unromantic European honeymoon. The two part ways,
and seem quite happy about the split.

            Via flashback, we learn the origin
of Tom and Sarah’s relationship. They’re a mismatched pair — she’s a
Wellesley grad with a degree in art history and a job at Sotheby’s; he’s a
community college-educated C-list radio traffic reporter. But none of that
matters because love conquers all, right? The couple moved in together after
one month and got engaged in less than a year, despite numerous misgivings from
Sarah’s blueblood family.

            After an abbreviated wedding scene,
the two kids take off on what could almost be called Kelso’s European Vacation, in that, thanks to bad luck, timing, and
manners, just about everything goes wrong. Heck, you’ve seen the trailer —
you know what happens. All the bad things that Tom and Sarah encounter are
right there, and all of the mindless stuff that comes in between these dreary
events helps to create a colossal, time-wasting flop that is offensive to every
fiber of my being. Most of it is weakly re-hashed bits from other, funnier
films, specifically the first two Vacation flicks and There’s Something About Mary,
right down to the dog flying out the window.

Interested
in unsanitized movie ramblings from Jon? Visit his site, Planet Sick-Boy
www.sick-boy.com, or listen to him on WBER’s Friday Morning Show.

This article appears in Jan 15-21, 2003.