City Hall: Conspiração no Alto Escalão

I had been long awaiting this movie ever since I saw the trailer, which made it look like a political drama, starring three of my favorite actors; Al Pacino, John Cusack, and Bridget Fonda. And even though it was directed by Harold Becker, who has done uneven work, he and Pacino did combine on SEA OF LOVE, which ranks among each of their best work. But interference on some level(for starters, several of the scenes in the original trailer don't appear in the movie) and changing of tone(subsequent trailers make it look like a thriller) make this, while watchable, nowhere near as it could have been.

Which is too bad, because I really wanted to like this movie. There was great potential here to be a film about how government can still be worthwhile despite all the corruption, and to make a complex statement about that corruption, not the usual good guys vs. bad guys. And there is good acting here. Pacino and Cusack are both very good, and Danny Aiello gives one of the best performances of his career. But Fonda is wasted in her role, having nothing to do, and while there is merit in the central storyline, when it turns to a thriller, the movie loses its way, briefly recovers in the final scene between Cusack and Pacino, and then falls down completely in the end. I wish I could like this more, but no.

This is one of the best acted political films you will see.

At the beginning you get a good idea of some of the wheeling and dealing the local politicians do just to get votes and keep various factions satisfied.

There are four writers credited with the screenplay and three of those are recognised top drawer writers.

It is obvious that the film has gone through various manifestations, gestations, rewrites and conceptual readjustments before a final, locked script emerged.

The movie dealing with a shooting that leaves a cop dead as well as an innocent child sets off a chain of events that leads to political skulduggery.

While others might find the film hard going, even dense, there is no denying the quality of the acting.

I read the negative comments before viewing this film and undeterred, went ahead and started watching. I admit that I had to rewind quite a few times as the film is incredibly complex, involved and full of detail. That is a good thing but also, quite unexpected in this culture of car chases, explosions, gratuitous sex and general violence that substitute for plot and character development. In fact, what a welcome departure, however, I am so used to not paying a lot of attention to what I watch.

This film is chock full of character development and plot line; the kind that we used to analyze when I was in high school. It requires actual mental participation on the part of the viewer. What a nice change. I would compare it to 'All The President's Men' in terms of generic subject matter. That is, it is a mystery about intense misconduct on the part of elected officials and those with enough influence upon officials to essentially 'own' them.

Unlike 'All The President's Men', this film makes an effort to give a couple of the characters actual personality. In this sense the movie is a character study like 'The Negotiatior' with Samuel Jackson and Kevin Spacey. In that movie, their characters are both city employees and the plot is extremely intense. Yet, the plot is dependent on the ability of their characters to cooperate with each other, trust each, and ultimately unite together against the corrupt Police Department. There is more gun fire in this film and the specific plot is different but generically, there are many similarities.

I WILL say that City Hall requires a whole lot more concentration. In fact, I was struck how parallel it was to past and present political scandals I've seen in my life going back to Watergate. The thing is, the public knows that something is wrong, for sure! but following the details is hard to do. This movie is not even close to being as complex as real life but it actually is realistic to life in its complexity. I think that is one of the reasons that previous posters have criticized the film: unrealistic expectations.

If one watches this knowing what they are about to see and are up to the experience, it really is excellent! I watched it 3 times in a row! The acting is superb and the directing is flawless. The weakest link is John Cusak's accent.

Being a transplanted New Yorker, I might be more critical than most in watching City Hall. But I have to say that before even getting to the story itself I was captivated by the location shooting and the political atmosphere of New York City that Director Harold Becker created.

For example there's a reference to Woerner's Restaurant in Brooklyn where political boss Frank Anselmo likes to eat. There is or was a Woerner's Restaurant on Remsen Street in downtown Brooklyn when I lived in New York back in 1996. It was in fact particularly favored by political people in the Borough though they did have a couple of other hangouts.

No surprise because the script was co-authored by Nicholas Pileggi who still writes both political and organized crime stories. He knows the atmosphere quite well and he sure knows how those two worlds cross as they do in this film.

A detective played by Nestor Serrano goes for an unofficial meeting with a relative of mob boss Anthony Franciosa and things erupt and three people wind up dead, including an innocent 6 year old boy whose father was walking him to school. The story mushrooms and at the end it's reached inside City Hall itself.

Al Pacino plays Mayor John Pappas and John Cusack is his Deputy Mayor a transplanted Louisianan, a state which has a tradition of genteel corruption itself. He's the outsider here and in trying to do damage control, Cusack finds more than he bargained for,

Danny Aiello plays Brooklyn political boss Frank Anselmo and for those of you not from New York, his character is based on the late Borough President of Queens Donald Manes who was also brought down by scandal. He's very much the kind of Brooklyn politician I knew back in the day whose friendship with organized crime and favors done for them, do Aiello in.

City Hall was the farewell performance on film for Anthony Franciosa, one of the most underrated and under-appreciated talents ever on the screen. No one watches anyone else whenever he's on.

Al Pacino's best moment is when at the funeral of the young child killed, he takes over the proceedings and turns it into a political triumph for himself. His is a complex part, he's a decent enough man, but one caught up in the corruption it takes to rise in a place like New York.

For those who want to know about political life in the Big Apple, City Hall is highly recommended.

Pacino offers another stellar performance in this generally captivating political suspense story - starts off a bit slow but then the script really begins to gel a third through the film, leading to a terrific Greek tragedy imbued climax. If you generally like movies underscoring power struggles, under the table mischief, and on-location NYC film shooting, you can't go wrong giving this film a try - generally it never really struck a chord with most big shot critics but that doesn't mean it doesnt have its appeal - especially for genre lovers.