DIRECTOR
Mike Newell
SCREENWRITER
Paul
Attanasio
based
on the book by
Joseph
D. Pistone
Richard Woodley
PRODUCERS
Louis DiGiaimo
Mark Johnson
Barry Levinson
Gail Mutrux
CINEMATOGRAPHER
Peter Sova
MUSIC
Patrick Doyle
EDITOR
Jon Gregory
CAST
Al Pacino (Lefty Ruggiero)
Johnny Depp (Joe Pistone/Donnie Brasco)
Michael Madsen (Sonny Black)
Bruno Kirby (Nicky)
James Russo (Paulie)
Anne Heche (Maggie Pistone)
Zeljko Ivanek (Tim Curley)
Gerry Becker (Dean Blandford)
MPAA rating: R
Running
time: 127m
U.S. release: February 28, 1997
Video availability: VHS - DVD
Official
website
|
In
his recent films, dating back to his undeniably funny turn in
Dick Tracy, Al Pacino has become a compulsive ham -- one
step away from being a self-parody that his fans laugh at affectionately,
as we do now with Dennis Hopper or Jack Nicholson. A friend of
mine loves to parody Pacino ripping his glasses off in City
Hall and bellowing "Thass all I wanna know!"
In that movie, and also in Heat
and even in Scent of a Woman, Pacino's motto seemed to
be "The louder the better."
But he's a great actor, and he still has plenty of surprises
left in him. In Donnie Brasco, a superbly crafted true-life
mobster film, Pacino plays a shabby, aging gangster named Lefty
Ruggerio, and he gives a performance that nearly erases our memory
of his awful grandstanding in Heat and City Hall.
Pacino is quiet here, exhausted and bitter -- he turns Lefty
into a wiseguy version of Willy Loman. There's deep pathos in
his portrait of a mobster who never made it.
Pacino would make Donnie Brasco worth a look even if it
were a dud, but it isn't. The title character, whose real name
is Joseph Pistone, is an FBI agent who infiltrates a New York
crime family by getting close to Lefty. Johnny Depp, who plays
Pistone, turns in a brilliant poker-faced performance. For most
of the movie, the undercover Pistone must keep his expression
perfectly blank (he can't react with horror to the sudden bursts
of violence or he'll give himself away), and yet Depp always
lets us know what Pistone is thinking. He does this with no voice-over
narration and a bare minimum of dialogue.
With a quieter Pacino and the deft silent actor Depp, Donnie
Brasco is free to be subtle. Director Mike Newell (Four
Weddings and a Funeral) and the great screenwriter Paul Attanasio
(Quiz Show) pay as much attention to emotional details
as to the clockwork details of mob life. When Pistone visits
his wife Maggie (Anne Heche), who's always in the dark about
what he's doing, the camera lingers on Pistone putting away cereal
boxes. A wonderful touch: it dramatizes how diligently Pistone
must organize his dual life. Mob over there, family over here.
Many reviewers have singled out the scene in which Pistone refuses
to remove his shoes in a Japanese restaurant (his tape recorder
is in his boot). That's a terrific bit, but what stayed with
me were the scenes between Pistone and his new friend. Lefty,
whose own son is a junkie, seems to cling to Pistone as the son
he should have had. Pistone doesn't know how to react to Lefty's
fierce love for him, and for me the best moment in the film is
when Lefty confronts Pistone with evidence that seems to blow
his cover. He takes out his gun and scares Pistone with it, but
not by aiming it at him.
Donnie Brasco ends with two eloquently silent bits from
Pacino and Depp, after the FBI closes in on the mob family. Lefty
puts his valuables in a drawer and goes to meet his fate, while
Pistone accepts a medal and a check, his expression frozen and
stoic. What are these men thinking? We can spend hours filling
in the blanks left by this great and saddening movie. |