A Lei de Newman

A nearly blind rental, the George Peppard vehicle "Newman's Law" impressed me more than I'd have imagined. It's a solid cop flick from the great days of cop flicks, and takes place in Los Angeles. Interestingly, the downbeat approach to it made me think San Francisco, yet without the trolleys and hills. This is a testament to the workmanship of the film- it's not about the glitz of LA, it's about the hard life of an 15+ year veteran detective on the job, still plugging away though getting old.

The most difficult part of the film is that there is a vibe of television drama to it that try as it might, it cannot shake free of. This is the first film directed by Richard T. Heffron, who also directed the well known Peppard show "Banacek". Something about the seriousness of the characters, even though a good effort was put forward to flesh out their personages, smacks of period cop show. Not to insinuate that period cop shows were particularly bad, just think that this film has a little bit more "Kojak" than it does "CHiPs".

The cast for this film was excellent. Peppard is not to be outdone, as Newman he's merely reserved and serious, a man of principles who will not tolerate graft or corruption. He is not a racist nor is he the ham-fisted violent cop so popular in film following "The French Connection." Roger Robinson, a black actor who is admittedly new to me, is excellent as his loyal partner Garry, who we see developed far beyond the basic black/white buddy-film aesthetic. Garry has a child and a wife(the stately Marlene Clark) and a life that is shown to contrast with that of Newman. Newman is the loner and Garry has it more together. Eugene Roche is a superior of the police, Abe Vigoda plays an accurate mafioso, Victor Campos is a great new recruit flatfoot, and actor/jazz saxophonist Mel Stewart is a crime boss. As you can see, many TV actors abound in this production.

It's got a good, darker-than-usual tone to it, similar to the excellent "Busting" of the same time period. Dimly-lit scenes and Peppard's excellent styles (he wears some very slick jackets in this) give "Newman's Law" some real power. One of the better, lesser-known cop flicks of the early 70s.

"Newman's Law" is not one of classic cop movies of the 1970s but it's still a good one. The second half of this movie, when Newman goes to war, is really good. I don't know how it happened but I saw this movie in the theater (Floral Park, NY) when I was nine years old and my brother was seven. We saw it by ourselves as part of a double feature with "My Name is Nobody". I took me decades to see it again. The only scene that I remembered was the "rent a camera" scene. I wonder why? "Newman's Law" is a well acted, good looking movie. I'm glad that I caught up with it. Honorable mention: the very good DVD commentary by Peter Tonguette.

A good action movie very well interpreted by absolutely all the actors. I immediately recognized Abe Vigoda, Tessio from The Godfather, (born to play mobsters with such a face) because most of the other actors are not well known. Except for the main role, of course, seen by me in many good films as well, Mister George Peppard: Breakfast at Tiffany's, Operation Crossbow, The Blue Max, Damnation Alley, The A-Team. I knew also Michael Lerner from a few other films, in which he always play the same type of character.

"Newman's Law" was a movie originally intended as a pilot for a television series...a series that was never to be. It seems that George Peppard had just finished filming his "Banacek" series and was looking for another TV project. And, after seeing the film, I can understand why the networks passed on it. After all, the movie was about an L. A. cop...and played NOTHING like "Dragnet" or "Adam-12", series that glorified policework AND tried to portray them realistically. Instead, it was more like "Serpico" and "Dirty Harry"....pretty potent stuff for TV.

VInce Newman (Peppard) is a detective working the Narcotics Division. He and his partner just uncovered a big crime...with a dead man, a thief and a whole lotta illegal drugs. But the best part is that the mobster Falcone is implicated in all this and now the D. A. has enough evidence to have him extradited to the US to face charges. In order to muddy the case, the mob starts paying off cops and making it look like Newman is on the take. Now this set-up really makes no sense--he and his partner just located the biggest stash of drugs the department ever confiscated and he helped the case against Falcone...and now suddenly every cop seems to believe he's dirty?! This just didn't make a lot of sense. But then, this is an action-oriented script and believability didn't seem high on their agenda.

This show would never play well if it was made today. It's not the violence level but the glorification of vigilante style police work and a complete disregard for the Bill of Rights (such as Newman working over folks he arrests as well as shooting up the mobster's compound for kicks). In other words, the show seems to say that the best way to fight evil is to ignore the law and bust heads....or worse.

The bottom line is that this is a movie featuring lots of shooting, things exploding and the like...with very little in the way of realism or characterization. I especially had to laugh at the execution scene at the nursing home...it was utterly ridiculous and made "Dirty Harry" look like the height of realism!

Personal favorite Peppard film. It's such a dark flick. Newman lives in a world that is completely against his existence. It becomes abundantly clear that Newman is fighting a losing battle as the movie progresses. No matter what he does or how he moves the world is against him. The loner we know in Peppard is stuck in a word where more than anything he needs a friend. I love the way Peppard carries himself given the circumstance. Yes things are dark. Yes I wish this world was better, but I'm here and I'm going to make the best of it. I'll always love him for doing that.