There is a brief moment in "L.A. Confidential" where a billboard is shown advertising the Los Angeles Police Department as "a job you can be proud of." The rest of this stylish, testosterone-fueled thriller goes about demolishing that claim.
It is Christmas Eve in 1950s Los Angeles and "L.A. Confidential" makes it clear from the start that it is not going to approach the era with dewy-eyed nostalgia.
In the first 20 minutes alone we witness the LAPD brutalize a wife beater, set up two young actors in a pot bust and nearly massacre a group of Mexicans in their jail cells. The latter gets the headline "Bloody Christmas" in the newspaper and triggers a shakedown within the police department.
The veteran Captain Dudley Smith (James Cromwell) sets his standards high. He only respects those cops willing to plant evidence, give false witness and shoot a known criminal if he thought a lawyer could get him off. All in the name of justice.
At the heart of "L.A. Confidential" are two relatively unknown Australian actors (with perfect American accents) whose characters appear to sit on opposite ends of the corruption spectrum.
Bud White (Russell Crowe) is a brutally tough cop with a penchant for saving damsels in distress who believes the quickest way to justice is through his fists. After taking part in "Bloody Christmas" White is briefly suspended, then reinstated because Captain Smith needs some muscle for a few special jobs.
Sergeant Ed Exley (Guy Pearce) is a disgustingly upstanding rookie whose adherence to the rules wins him few friends in the force. Worsening the situation is that he rats out his fellow officers in the prison beatings, including White's partner, in return for a promotion.
Both give star making performances and nearly overshadow Kevin Spacey as Officer Jack Vincennes. Vincennes is the technical advisor on a "Dragnet" type television show and he lives for his celebrity status.
The editor of the weekly tabloid "Hush-Hush," played by Danny DeVito knows this and helps him set up political figures or other celebrities for front page arrests, an immensely profitable deal for both.
Spacey is at his smarmy best with Vincennes, nearly stealing the show with his wry delivery and monstrous ego. But Vincennes is also a man whose career has lost direction in life. When asked why he became a cop, he answers, "I don't remember."
The labyrinthine plot of "L.A. Confidential" is confusing. There are many plot strings running along side each other, but it all comes together satisfactorily in the end.
Now that former narcotics king Mickey Cohen is in prison, someone is knocking off all his former colleagues and 25 pounds of heroine is missing.
Captain Dudley Smith scares away any criminals by beating them till they leave town.
White's ex-partner turns up dead in a coffee shop massacre. Exley is on the case, but White makes it personal.
Vincennes stumbles upon a high class prostitution and pornography ring where the hookers look like movie stars. One such prostitute is found dead at the coffee shop and leads White to Lynn Bracken (Kim Basinger), a prostitute who looks like Veronica Lake.
White and Bracken quickly fall for each other, but is she being ordered to keep White busy by her boss?
Is Exley getting sucked into the seething world of corruption?
Nothing is clear-cut in this complex and intriguing film. The story piles up on top of itself and so do the corpses.
Yet throughout the high body count and sometimes revolting violence, director Curtis Hanson keeps the story moving. Like most of our best crime movies the violence is part of the story, part of the way of life the filmmakers have chosen to explore.
Although often compared to "Chinatown" because of its setting, "L.A. Confidential" is more reminiscent of "The Godfather." Like that earlier milestone, it destroys the glamour of an era by giving us sudden bursts of shocking violence. Instead of watching the allure of power and betrayal destroy the Corleone family, we watch it ruin the LAPD.
