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As Good As It Gets

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

I thought I was in for another Tony Rome when I rented The Detective: a silly, 1960s screwball detective comedy that made incessant sex jokes to celebrate the end of the Hays Code. Boy, was I wrong! The Detective is a very heavy drama, and while it absolutely takes advantage of the drop of the Hollywood censors, it does so very tastefully. There's nothing funny about this movie, and unlike many 60s movies, it's not dated.Frank Sinatra plays the title character, and the plot alternates between his work life and his home life, showing his strain as he juggles being a detective with being a man. He falls into a whirlwind romance with beautiful Lee Remick, and the love scenes are steamy without being obscene, a combination that helps keep the movie classy.The film discusses touchy issues like murder, the death penalty, homosexuality, nymphomania, and police confession tactics. Frank Sinatra gives a wonderfully conflicted performance; on one hand, he objects to using inhumane tactics on murder suspects, and on the other, he treats his wife disrespectfully when he comes home. "I came here to ball—ain't that what you do best?" he shouts during an argument. On the third hand, does she perhaps deserve this treatment? Watch The Detective to find out! It's entertaining and the acting is very good. I recommend it! DLM Warning: There's one scene where someone jumps from the top of a building and the camera spins out of control during the fall. It's about halfway through the movie, so keep on the lookout.

Goodbye and Good Riddance to the Production Code that had Censored Hollywood for Decades. It was the Birth of Freedom for Filmmakers and Birth is always Painful. This can be Witnessed by this New Approach, Uneasy at times, of on screen Displays of Subjects and Characters that during the Hays Era were only Hinted at with Code Words or Symbolism.This Film so Embraced the New Esthetic that it could be Accused of Trying too Hard, or at least Taking on too Many Themes in a Single Film. "The Detective" includes Homosexuality, Homophobia, Nymphomania, Drugs, Police Brutality, Police and Political Corruption.Frank Sinatra was a Complicated Cat. He Prided Himself on Individualism and Liberal Leanings. He was Socially Conscious and a Political Participant. He had Excelled in Cutting Edge Films like The Manchurian Candidate (1962), The Man with the Golden Arm (1955), and the Low-Budget Sleeper Suddenly (1954).Here He is Well Cast as an Aging Police Detective who has to Fight more than just Crime. He's got all He can Handle on the Job as well as a Personal Life and Wife that is Psychologically Damaged.This is a Daring and Brutal Film that Explores the Gay Underworld. It might seem Dated and Over the Top as it Deals with the Homosexual Community but it Manages to keep its Tolerance Level on the Right Side. There is just so much here that is on the Edge in its Exposing the Underbelly of not only the Counter Culture but the Corrupt Ruling Class Culture. Overall, it is a Compelling Example of the Emerging Zeitgeist and a Good Example of the Beginning of the New Hollywood. It has some Style and is a Must See for Film Historians and Sociologist as well as Movie Buffs that Enjoy Hard-Boiled Detective Films.

Part of the Film Noir genre is the romance angle with a powerful female lead. This neo-noir fails on that point offering a watered down, trifling character portrayed by a non-threatening Lee Remick, whose eyes the director seems obsessed with capturing long expressionless shots of. Sinatra's acting is fine, but the film technique... I can't explain how it makes him seem uncool, and the character of Leland is extremely cool and wildly open-minded for the time. Trouble is, they go very far out of their way to make him seem at once overly modern, and decidedly anchored in his values. Doesn't work. I didn't care for the camera work at all. A brilliant performance by Tony Musante as the basket-case ex-lover of the murdered gay man in the opening sequence is dminished by not properly photographing it. Great story and plot. Very sadly executed in a "message over story" way.

Based on the 1966 novel by Roderick Thorp, THE DETECTIVE was among the highest grossing films of both 1968 and one of the most popular of Frank Sinatra's film career. At the time it was considered remarkably honest in its portrait of a no-nonsense cop who finds himself trapped between a series of compromises and his own sense of integrity. Today, however, it chiefly notable for its unintentional window onto 1960s homophobia.Joe Leland (Frank Sinatra) is a third generation New York City police officer who begins the film with two victories: in his private life, he has wooed and won a remarkably beautiful wife, Karen (Lee Remick); in his professional life, he is assigned to a particularly notorious murder case that he quickly solves and which results in a major promotion. But both explode in his face in particularly unsavory ways. Although flawless on the surface, Karen is a distinctly disturbed woman who shatters their marriage through a series of compulsive affairs. And although it seems solved, the case on which Joe's promotion rests may not be nearly as simple as every one thought at the time.The case involves the brutal murder of a gay man who is found with his head battered in and sexually mutilated--a circumstance that leads Joe and his co-workers to prowl 'known homosexual hangouts' such as gyms and the waterfront. In the process, the film creates a portrait of the gay community that says considerably less about the gay community than the way in which heterosexual America thought of it at the time. The gay men themselves are improbable, being pulled out of group gropes from the back of cargo trucks, flexing muscles in tawny-colored gyms, frequenting bars notable for satin and velvet, and lounging about in silk robes. They come in two basic varieties, victim and predator. They are weak and are routinely brutalized by both each other and the police, the latter of which positively delight in knocking them around.This is not particularly unusual for films of the 1960s and the 1970s; it is much the same portrait presented by such diverse films as ADVISE AND CONSENT and CRUISING. What is unusual is Joe's attitude toward them: unlike his co-workers, he dislikes seeing them mistreated and prefers to see them (and indeed all other suspects) accorded a certain basic respect as human beings. It was a very, very bold stance for a film to take at the time. Even so, it does not counterbalance the portrait itself, which is intrinsically demeaning, or the story, which ultimately pivots on a version of "gay panic"--a heterosexual myth used here with a slight spin.The chief grace of the film is the performances of Sinatra and Remick. Today Sinatra is best recalled as a singer, but he had some significant acting chops, and he proves more than able to over the shortcomings of the script. Lee Remick, a much-admired actress, is flawlessly cast as the perfidious wife Karen, a woman who superficial qualities conceal an unraveling personality. The supporting cast, which features Jacqueline Bissett, Jack Klugman, and Robert Duvall, is also quite fine. But the script is weak, the story choppy, the film is a shade too glossy for its subject--and its incredibly naive portrait of gay men tends to overpower everything.All films must be considered in the context of their eras, but even so a good film can transcend its era. THE DETECTIVE doesn't manage to do that: sometimes ridiculous to the point of being amusing, sometimes so grotesque that it becomes a bit embarrassing. All the same, it remains interesting primarily because it offers a window on what mainstream Americans of the 1960s thought homosexuals were like. The DVD offers the film in original widescreen format; the transfer, however, is merely acceptable. Recommended primarily to Sinatra fans and film historians interested in Hollywood's frequently off-the-wall portray of gay men.GFT, Amazon Reviewer