Mad City

MAD CITY is exciting and thrilling from the first scene.

A talented success-hunting reporter is sent by his boss to a totally not interesting job: to do a story about a museum with financiary problems. Upset and defeated, DUSTIN HOFFMAN's character goes there and has the chance of running into what will prove to be the story of his life: a guy enters the museum and takes everyone inside hostage. It's a smart movie, just because it debates themes that can only lead to smart scenes. Probably the best thing about MAD CITY are the actors: Travolta and Hoffman are great in their roles and they add an extra-value to the movie by the way they act.

What if you really need money to support your family and you just got fired? How far are you able to go to get your job back? Far enough to enter a museum and threat the owner with a gun? Surely. But what if by mistake you do something that you can't get out from? That's Travolta's situation.

What if all your life you aimed for a great story that will totally change everything about you? How far are you able to go? Far enough to play the victim's life in your hands an organise a live show from which you practically doom him to death? That's Hoffman's situation.

The plot grows rapidly and it's very convincing. And the ending is the only one possible.

Costa-Gavras does a great job with this movie and manages to mantain balance between the characters and the action. Good job. Vote: 8 out of 10.

This movie gets off to a slow start. To be honest it doesn't build much suspense. It does, however, have a message about modern society. People have a fascination with crisis situations and media personalities feed on that fact like sharks in a frenzy. That can lead situations to escalate out of control.

Dustin Hoffman stole the show as Max Brackett. A fellow viewer couldn't believe that he was the same man that had played in Rainman. He delivers a standout performance as TV news reporter Max Brackett who is looking to inject life back into his career but at the same time retains some sense of compassion and justice. The forces battle inside him through out the film.

John Travolta was on the money but not stellar as Sam Bailey, a recently unemployed security guard on the cusp of losing everything that he owns. Sam is a bit of low watt bulb, but he is basically a good person caught up in a very bad choice and situation that runs awry of his plans. He is very distraught about his situation and popping caffiene pills to stay awake doesn't help his state of mind much either. Not one of Travolta's best but it is still good.

What a pleasure to watch Alan Alda in front of the camera again. As Kevin Hollander he is the guy that you love to hate. Hollander is Max Brackett's nemesis and antagonist. Alda easily departs from his compassionate portrayal of Dr. Haweye Pierce on TV's MASH for this one.

This isn't a perfect film but it is a good one. It will leave you thinking about the message that it has. The acting is good to great.

I was so depressed when I left this movie - depressed in a good way though, in the way the filmmakers wanted me to be. "The media has become an out-of-control circus," I thought to myself. Certainly not an original thought or insight, and not extremely different from many other movies and stories out there with a similar message. The difference with "Mad City", though, was that it didn't play this insight for satire or sly comedy. There's an anger and a sadness that runs through the entire movie - a burning regret that this is the way things have to be. The filmmakers could have easily reached for humor or gaudy overstatement to make their points (as was done, say, in "Network" or "Natural Born Killers") but instead they keep most everything at the human level, and that makes all the difference. We come to feel really bad for the Travolta character; the screenwriters' making him such a simpleton is, I'll admit, a bit manipulative, but as manipulations go it's a good one and a smart one - it lets us see the toll in human terms of the media frenzy. Dustin Hoffman and particularly Alan Alda are expert in their roles as media sharks, and the sort of Mutt and Jeff (or perhaps George and Lenny) relationship which Hoffman and Travolta get into here is really marvelous. It has beats of comedy to it, while never being anything less than totally serious (kind of like Hoffman and Cruise in "Rain Man" - though the film never strains for that connection).

I think of this movie often in conjunction with "Wag the Dog," Hoffman's other movie that year and for me it's no comparison: "Wag the Dog" is gleefully cynical, seems to take real joy in the media being so ever-present and the audience being so easily conned. For me, that rings as hollow satire; "Mad City" by truly trying to examine and get us to think about (not just laugh at) the media's power is miles away the better film.

A second seeing of this film recently confirmed my impressions on seeing `Missing' (1982)(qv) also a second time a few months back. Costa-Gavras has things to say and he does not mince up his message.

In `Missing' he succeeded in getting Jack Lemmon to play a convincing role, and in `Mad City' he managed to get John Travolta to carry out the best role I have seen him in: his playing of a deranged simple worker real mad at having lost his job is truly memorable. Dustin Hoffman ably supports but without exceeding himself overly.

However, rather than the actors in themselves, it is the story itself which is more important and its message: getting the story on your TV news programme before your competitors is much more important than any other considerations – such as in this case, a group of schoolchildren held hostage with a shotgun aimed at them. But do not worry about them – get the story live on TV at any price, what a scoop! what a sensation!

And thus we live at the dictates of that ogre of communications called TV: whether wars in Rwanda or Afghanistan or Palestinians blowing themselves up in Israeli cafés or airliners crashing into the WTC, the most important thing is to get it live on screen for the hungry masses. We are at the mercy of papirazzi, that merciless squad of camera-toting fame-seekers, who have no scruples at getting their story first or even inventing it.

Thanks for the message, Costa-Gavras: I learnt it long ago, but you tell it well.

Man, this was some indictment of the television-reporter-mentality! It was exaggerated, of course, but still interesting to see and in many respects good to see because of the onslaught of tabloid-mentality journalism that seems to have taken over the media in recent years. That kind of "reporting" should be exposed and ridiculed.

Whatever, you can enjoy this film for the acting alone with Dustin Hoffman, John Travolta, Alan Alda, Robert Prosky, Mia Kirschner and Ted Levine. These actors, and some good dialog, make the film move along at a good clip despite the absence of much happening on screen.

The story gets you involved and reminds me of the famous 70s film, Dog Day Afternoon, in which much of the film takes place in a bank. Here, it's a museum, and a man is in a predicament something like Al Pacino was in that film except Travolta's character here is totally innocent.

The screenwriters added bit of humor to this involving story and that made it even better. It's very good entertainment and certainly recommended.