dennisb-6

Made apparently by committee (you know you're in trouble when more than two writers are credited), not sure whether it's a caper movie, a horror-suspense, comedy or (even!) a sex- farce. Bad writing, scenery-chewing acting, absurd mcguffin; the only thing good about this disgrace is the main set, some kind of uber-luxurious hotel room in downtown Toronto. Worst of all, though, the direction, which seems utterly uninformed, unaware of where the drama in the 'script' might be, and tragically devoted to sappy, sometimes hilariously inappropriate background music.

A sure miss.

Out of the grayness of film noir drama comes a pondering on the gray area of social engineering.

Dial 1119 is a film discussion of the distention between straight-ahead law enforcement and the brand-new authority of psychological intervention in criminal matters. The heart of the film is the series of conversations between the Homicide Captain and the forensic psychiatrist. Therein lies a clear blueprint of the issues: Is it better to identify and treat society's offenders, rather than simply punish? What should the treatment be; confinement, medicine or capital punishment? In view of the fact they prosecuted a man for murder and saw him escape the electric chair to kill again, are the police to be blamed for being skeptical of the medical model in dealing with crime? Are we to condemn the doctor's humanist courage as simple folly, or celebrate it as a noble march toward higher existence?

I found the relationship between police and doctor to be unique in cinema, can't remember when I've ever seen it so clearly and dramatically drawn. Also, the characterizing vignettes of the various hostages were deftly wrought. Overall, a remarkable film rendered nearly into the realm of science-fiction by the dominance of a 48 inch flat screen TV over the main set, presaging the looming hypnotic sway the contraption would wield on a developing social world.

'Kelly's Heroes' is an enduring showpiece of brilliant cynicism, with a healthy attitude toward war. I used to watch this film with my uncle, an army veteran of Normandy-all-the-way-to- Berlin, on-the-ground fighting. He would laugh and say that as goofy as it all was, the movie portrayed war as he experienced it; stupid, tragic, pointless and nasty.

I think it further remarkable that this film was made and released during a time when US casualties in Viet Nam sometimes exceeded five hundred dead per week. It took political courage to script, cast, produce, and distribute a movie so contemptuous in its treatment of military authority. In these times of foreign wars I wonder when a film will be made that confronts the questions of our war-policies as aptly as 'Kelly's Heroes' dismisses those of the 1960's. If it never happens it won't be too tragic, we still have this film to re-visit every few years.