Friday, October 18, 1996
Academy Award-winning director Barry Levinson takes some of the
thunder from his actors and creates disturbing, fascinating
cinematic artistry.By Michael Horowitz
Daily Bruin Staff
When does someone deserve to die?
Or more specifically, when do they deserve to be killed?
These are questions that Barry Levinson’s "Sleepers" toys with
but ultimately abandons. We certainly know how the characters in
the film feel: Revenge is called for. And audiences certainly make
their sentiments known: Revenge is applauded. But the film tries to
change the issue to one of friendship and maturation. "Sleepers"
plays with a really bold statement that could have elevated this
film to another level and then takes an easier way out.
Not that this is an easy film. It’s not. But it’s also not a
masterpiece, despite the assemblage of enough high-caliber,
Oscar-inducing talent to start its own awards show. This
child-abuse version of "Goodfellas" deserves your attention, but
not your worship.
We start with four friends growing up in Hell’s Kitchen in the
mid-60s. They’re your average batch of cinematic brats, peeking at
naked ladies, antagonizing the local vendors and avoiding their
parents as much as possible, but Levinson never shoots for
bargain-basement nostalgia. A sense of gloom hangs over the 45
minutes we spend in the neighborhood, occasionally embodied by
blunt wife beatings, the ramifications of the war in Vietnam, and
the ever-present foreboding narration. Finally we get to "the
event" that creates the story, and the kids rip off a hot dog
vendor. The botched crime results in the foursome being sent to an
upstate school for boys, despite the aid of the friendly priest
(Robert De Niro).
The place looks nice on the outside, but no one’s under any
illusions about the horrors soon to come. We meet the head of the
guards (Kevin Bacon), and we know things are headed from bad to
worse. While the movie never dragged for the first segment,
Levinson switches into a higher gear for the middle third. He seems
to acknowledge the audience’s experience with this particular
doomsday scenario and he doesn’t bother with the middle-ground
taunting that we’ve seen in countless other films, especially last
year’s impressive "The Boys of St. Vincent." The worst imaginable
happens before we really get our bearings, and we’re launched to
1981.
It’s at the commencement of this third segment that "Sleepers"
makes its stab at greatness, and it is an intoxicating 20 minutes.
Suffice to say that the four now-fully grown young men find their
former captors, exact their revenge and then they deal with the
ramifications. The justification is repeatedly made through harsh
bursts of flashbacks; we, like the characters in question, are
never allowed to forget about the first half of the story. The film
gets mired down in a mediocre courtroom drama with Brad Pitt facing
off against Dustin Hoffman in a case at odds with the plot itself.
The payoff is predictable, and the steps up to it are weak.
So why doesn’t "Sleepers" pack more of an emotional punch?
It’s a question that can’t be easily answered, but may lie at
its lack of human participation and thin characters. For all its
run-time and uncomfortable close-ups, you don’t get much out of the
participants. With the high caliber of talent at play, Levinson’s
film has really made few attempts to conform to its actors. Both
the structure and the stylistic devices eat away at the
performances themselves, delivering the viewer a tangible emotional
effect, but few characters manage to sort themselves out of the
mix. Come awards time, a film that could have been nominated ad
infinitum is going to be hard-pressed to yield a Best Performance.
The film’s victims are lacking in Oscar moments; every time they
start recounting their horrors, the music swells and the flashbacks
begin. The film’s antagonists never get their moments of subtlety
either, there’s nothing between an initial greeting and hard-core
brutality. Bacon, for one, never gets the chance to really get
under your skin.
Thus, the strongest cast in recent memory ends up about where
they started. The film tells an intriguing story, but the viewer
ends up finding out more about Levinson than his actors. None of
these fine performers adds anything substantial to their repertoire
except perhaps the kids, who didn’t have much to begin with. And
that makes for far too many acting icons treading water.
Grade: B+
"Sleepers," written and directed by Barry Levinson. Starring
Brad Pitt, Robert De Niro, Kevin Bacon, Jason Patric and Dustin
Hoffman.
Warner Brothers
Brad Pitt and Jason Patric play childhood friends in
"Sleepers."Warner Brothers
Robert De Niro as the friendly priest.Warner Brothers
(l.-r.) Ron Eldard, Billy Crudup, Brad Pitt, Jason Patric and
Minnie Driver.