Viver e Morrer em Los Angeles

Secret service agents Jimmy Hart and Richard Chance (William Petersen) thwart an Islamic terrorist during a Presidential visit. Hart has a few days left before retirement. He tries to investigate and gets killed by counterfeiter Eric Masters (Willem Dafoe). Chance vows to take him down. He gets John Vukovich (John Pankow) as his new partner. They catch Masters' delivery boy Carl Cody (John Turturro). Masters' lawyer Bob Grimes (Dean Stockwell) says Cody has to do 3 years. Chance's C.I. Ruth Lanier (Darlanne Fluegel) directs them to lawyer Max Waxman. Waxman was Cody's last stop and Masters suspects he set them up. Masters and his girlfriend Bianca Torres (Debra Feuer) go to demand repayment and ends up killing him. Chance steals Waxman's black book as he becomes more morally corrupt in order to take down Masters.

William Friedkin delivers a slick thriller of amoral cops and immoral everyone else. I love Dafoe's montage of counterfeiting. Friedkin delivers so many great action scenes. The wrong way car chase is the highlight and probably the height of his action work. It is so slick and so stylized that I accept the avant-garde artsy stuff. It fits into the movie. It also has an early bungee jump on film. This is one of the most fun 80s action thriller filled with relatively unknown actors at the time. I can't help but think of Michael Mann who was showrunning Miami Vice TV show at the time.

When Friedkin went "back on the streets" in 1985 to make TO LIVE AND DIE IN L.A., he made a classic that will endure and that perfectly captures its 80's milieu.

I don't understand these idiots who complain how a film is "dated" by its music. Of course a film is "dated" by its specific elements, but so what. This superb film, which has an amazingly kinetic Wang Cheung score, is about a time (the mid-eighties) and place (L.A.) that is now history, and it is a punishing document.

The film works on many levels. Yes, it is about counterfeiting and superficial (re: counterfeit) relationships. It is about greed, survival, justice and morality. It is also about human beings using and laying to waste other human beings.

These powerful ingredients weave their way through a police procedural/action thriller plot that never stops to catch its breath and is pure cinema.

Willem Dafoe is totally engrossing as the film's villain, while William Peterson delivers a highly focused, tough turn. Dean Stockwell is also a stand-out as a crook lawyer and real cop Jack Hoar is quietly spectacular as Dafoe's mule.

And the film boasts one unbelievable car chase that has not been equaled since.

But LIVE AND DIE is also a film that expertly marries the visual to the aural and depicts a part of Southern California that has not been so credibly depicted before.

Dynamite!

This story is very 80's, and is heavily influenced by the TV show Miami Vice. The style, clothes, music, and characters reflect that time period exactly. The direction of this film gives a slick feel; where its action, style, and seedy underside all blend in well. The story could be very predictable, but with its plots twists, and the theme that follows the saying be careful when you go hunting for monster not to become one yourself gives it originality. It has some mind blowing stunts that create tension, and if you watch the film Ronin you see where they got the car chase idea from. In all this film gives a feeling of being involved in events that go too fast, too dangerous, and too twisted. Its shows what happens to the heart when the individual becomes obsessed with what he seeks. Watch this one and love it.

Worthy of the director of "French Connection," the pace of this set- in-LA action thriller immediately draws the view in and never lets up. A car chase in the best traditions of "Bullitt" and of Friedkin's own "French Connection" is centers the action, but the motivation of a rogue agent obsessed with the death of his partner, and clearly with his own death, are well- and credibly- drawn. The most sympathetic character in the story is not one of the principals. It is a female informer. An ex-con at the mercy of those on both sides of the law, she is callously exploited by all. Her feelings for Agent Chance are more implied than explicit, but they are believable as is his indifference to her as a person. This riveting film never lets your attention wander. Thanks to Friedkin, we are told, we are given a credible ending to this taut, tightly- wound thriller. An under-exposed, under-appreciated work; excellent for the genre.

This brutal film about a dirty cop's personal vendetta in the Los Angeles underworld of counterfeiting, snitching and ruthless executions was both hailed and criticised at the time it came out - for being unforgivingly realistic and unforgivingly vile, respectively. And they were all right; the film paints a harrowing picture of a cold, cynical macho culture in Reagan era L. A. in which everything and nothing was justifiable and where the distinction between the good guys and bad guys had been almost completely obliterated.

William Friedkin (The Exorcist) adapted and directed the film seemingly with an intention of not making any compromises. The film is as violent as anything you'll see from this period, like a cross between Dirty Harry and Cobra, completely free of moral justification, heck even moral discussion. It's not immoral, it's completely amoral. And Friedkin's use of violence is not a tad poetic or beautiful (like Tarantino's for example), but not fun and simple either (like the violence in many other films from this period). Friedkin's violence is dejected, serving only to suck the joy out of us and the characters in the film. But still we want to keep watching, because the film has an exhilarating quality to it, created in large by its stance: You're free to root for whomever you want; or better still - not root for anyone.

To Live and Die in L. A. doesn't speak to your empathy or sense of right and wrong; it speaks to your gut. It's thrilling in much the same way as a roller-coaster. The film is marred by some of the typical mid-80s weaknesses, like a masturbation of its own action set-pieces and simplified supporting characters. But on the other hand, it has a rawness to it which is missing from many of today's action films. And the fine performances by the two leads does a lot to enhance this effect, particularly a young Willem Dafoe who personifies this said rawness. Look also for Dean Stockwell as a delightfully slimy lawyer.