B-Movies and Couch Classics: Carlito’s Way • Zero Effect

B-Movies and Couch Classics
Carlito’s Way & Zero Effect

By Dan Dumbald of Movie Merchants

Carlito’s Way
Carlitos Way One of the biggest movies at the box office this summer is The Mask of Zorro starring Antonio Banderas. The film is the first American screen incarnation of Zorro to star an Hispanic actor in the role. Hollywood has a long history of casting non-Latinos in Latin roles. In fact, it seems like Italian-American Al Pacino gets to play more Hispanic characters than Andy Garcia.

A fine example of this cinematic cross-culturalization is the 1993 film Carlito’s Way. Pacino stars as Carlito Brigante, a career criminal recently released from jail and determined to go straight. Carlito’s plan is to move out of the Bronx to Florida and start his life over. Before he can realize his dream, Carlito needs to earn some money for the move and to start up his new business.

He takes a job managing a hot local disco, where he crosses paths with many old acquaintances. Carlito hooks up with his former right-hand man (Luis Guzman) and his shady lawyer, played by Sean Penn. Carlito also crosses paths with a young, up and coming gangster named Bennie Blanco from the Bronx (John Leguizamo). In addition, he rekindles a romantic relationship with Penelope Ann Miller, his longtime girlfriend.

As hard as he tries, Carlito cannot escape what he has done and who he was in the past. Sean Penn convinces him to get involved in a scheme to double cross the crime boss that wants him dead. As Carlito finally earns the money he needs to move to sunny Florida, all of the balls that he has been juggling start to drop. In a stunning final chase sequence through Grand Central Station, he is forced to avoid the mob, the police, and anyone else he has crossed and catch the train out of New York City with Miller.

Although he is probably better known for his first collaboration with director Brian De Palma in 1983’s Scarface, Carlito’s Way is easily one of Pacino’s best role. He plays Carlito with an understated grace and dignity that Tony Montana could never have achieved. De Palma, one of the most underrated filmmakers working today, takes a softer approach to the violence so pervasive in Scarface.

He also gets much more consistent performances from his cast (no ridiculous accents from Robert Loggia and Steven Bauer). Sean Penn was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his turn as the coked-up, pistol-toting lawyer. John Leguizamo is memorable as the young hotshot who is a mirror of Carlito at the same age. Penelope Ann Miller’s sweet innocence is a nice compliment to the streetwise Pacino.

Interestingly, Miller is the only actress to play the romantic interest of both Pacino and Robert De Niro (Awakenings).

Although, there has been a noticeable improvement in the fifteen year period since we were expected to believe that F. Murray Abraham was Hispanic in Scarface, Hollywood still needs to develop some memorable Latin characters who actually are Latino.

ZERO EFFECT
1998 WARNER BROTHERS
In the 1940s and ‘50s one of Hollywood’s most popular genre was the detective story. These films typically starred a hard-boiled private investigator who, while deciphering clues to solve the case, usually fell for the wrong woman. In the last twenty years there has been very few films that attempted to follow this formula, except for this year’s best sleeper Zero Effect.

Zero Effect stars Bill Pullman as Daryl Zero, the world’s greatest private dick. As good as Zero is as a sleuth, he is that bad dealing with anything else. He does not interact well with people so he has a smooth-talking attorney (played by Ben Stiller) meet all of his potential clients, while he plays bad songs on his guitar and pops pills.

Zero’s latest client is Ryan O’Neal, a wealthy businessman who enlisted his services to retrieve a set of lost keys. These keys go to a safe deposit box that contains something incriminating on O’Neal.

As Zero starts investigating the case the film shifts gears from a spoof of film noirs to an interesting detective yarn. Zero soon finds out that nothing is as it seems and there is a lot more to this case than O’Neal is letting on. In addition, Stiller’s fiancee wants him to quit as Zero’s mouthpiece and Zero meets a mysterious woman (Kim Dickens) with whom he begins to fall in love. With all of this going on it is going to take the incredible Daryl Zero to crack this case.

Interestingly, despite fairly big stars and a strong Grosse Pointe Blank-like appeal, Zero Effect only opened in select cities in early 1998. The film marks the debut of writer/director Jake Kasdan, who is the son of writer/director/producer Lawrence Kasdan (The Big Chill).

Kasdan has developed a script that is both quirky and intriguing. All of the characters are well-written. At first, Bill Pullman’s Daryl Zero appears to be one of those only-in-the-movies type characters who is called the world’s greatest sleuth and never proves it. However, it is fascinating to watch Zero in action as he observes every minute mannerism and characteristic of a person in order to figure where they are coming from. This film follows the pattern Bill Pullman has set with Lost Highway and The End of Violence in taking eclectic roles since hitting it big time with 1996’s Independence Day.

Ben Stiller, currently starring in the riotous Something About Mary, hits all of his comedic marks as Pullman’s deadpan straight man. The real find in this film is relative newcomer Kim Dickens. She has a natural beauty and quiet intelligence that makes her Daryl Zero’s match and a new screen talent to watch.

Zero Effect is the type of film that grows on you as you watch it. Kasdan never allows the viewer to be entirely comfortable with what he is doing with the movie and therein lies the film’s appeal. For anyone looking for a quirky little film with an interesting story to tell this is the film for you.